I bet you didn't know that there are 6,320,000 U.S. civilians living abroad. Of which 205,118 are military personnel deployed overseas, and 270,604 are Study abroad students. (That's a lot of study abroad students. More on that later.)
If overseas Americans were a state, we would be the 18th largest in the nation. (Sorry, Missouri!)
That also means that our votes, and our voices as Americans living abroad, count. And our votes are more important than ever with races being determined by razor thin margins that seem to get smaller and more nail bitingly close with every election cycle.
That's why Democrats Abroad has just launched its optimized global Get Out the Vote voter registration tool, www.VoteFromAbroad.Org, to make voter registration easier for the millions of US citizens who live abroad so they can request an absentee ballot, vote by mail, receive time sensitive voting information and help shape America's future. For maximum impact in 2012, www.VoteFromAbroad.Org is now compatible with mobile and tablet devices so that we can help register Americans wherever and whenever we find them abroad.
www.VoteFromAbroad.Org, launched in 2006, already has a strong (largely unknown) track record making the difference in razor thin races. Look at these electoral contests (where the margin of victory was smaller than the number of overseas ballots requested from www.VoteFromAbroad.Org):
• Senator Jon Tester (Montana, 2006): 3,562 votes
• Senator Jim Webb (Virginia, 2006): 9,329 votes
• Rep. Patrick Murphy (Pennsylvania 8th, 2006): 1,518 votes
• Rep. Tom Perriello (Virginia 5th, 2008): 745 votes
• Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy (Ohio 15th, 2008): 2,311 votes
• Senator Mark Begich (Alaska, 2008): 3,724 votes
• Senator Al Franken (Minnesota, 2008): 312 votes
Who would have thought that Democrats Abroad, with the most overseas voters from California, New York, Massachusetts, Texas, Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Michigan and Ohio, would be able to supply the votes to swing races in Montana, Minnesota and Alaska!
These facts give us all the more reason to scour the globe to find US voters all the way from the Antarctica to Zambia.
Students, help us by posting this video on your Facebook page, tumblr and blogs and get the word to your 270,604 study abroad colleagues. Everyone else tell all the Americans abroad you know!
As Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz said recently in a message to Democrats Abroad, "You may not realize this but your votes from abroad are making the difference in more and more elections across the country. For example, look at the razor thin victory of Senator Al Franken, (312 votes), who won by a margin smaller than the number of overseas ballots received. So please don't think just because you are far away you are forgotten, or that your voices or your votes don't matter in our elections. They do. And they may very well provide the margin of victory in November. Please get involved and help spread the word about www.VoteFromAbroad.org today."
Still not convinced? Top 5 (bad) reasons not to vote:
1. "I don't have a U.S. address anymore."
You don't need one. Your legal voting address is the last place you resided before leaving the country. 2. "They don't even count overseas ballots."
Utterly untrue. Every properly executed absentee ballot is included in the final certified count. It's the law. 3. "My vote won't make a difference."
Oh yes it can! (See animation.) 4. "I'm afraid of the I.R.S."
Don't be. Voting in federal elections does not affect the determination of tax liability or tax residence. You won't get a call from the IRS just because you voted in a federal election. 5. "I don't need to register. I did it last time."
Wrong! The law changed recently. You need to request a new ballot every election year.
In addition to FATCA, Obama has sat back and allowed the IRS to wage war on expats living overseas via the FBAR and other forms that are duplicative, onerous, and so open to interpretation that it is nearly impossible to agree on how to fill them out. The IRS has levied huge (and I mean HUGE) penalties for non-filing of FBARs, even for those who owe no taxes to the IRS. While I understand the need to find and punish tax evasion, the requirements for filing these forms capture almost every single person living abroad, 88% of who owe no taxes to the U.S. at all.
Add to this the fact that, as taxpayers, we have precisely zero representation in the U.S government and we are allowed to receive exactly zero benefits from our tax dollars that we pay... well, all I can hope is that Romney understand that the seven MILLION expats living abroad are ambassadors for the US, creating wealth, investment, business and employment for millions of citizens living at home in the US. President Obama seems to have missed this point.
P.S. I voted for Obama in the last election.
Based on this, I cannot with a clear conscience say that I would vote for President Obama again (Yes, I voted for him the first time around).
Kyla4u: In addition to FATCA, Obama has sat back and allowed
As an expat, I have never voted in a presidential election before, but I will certainly be voting in this one. Allowing FATCA to go through on the tail of the Hiring Incentives Bill in 2009 proves to me that Obama does not have a good sense of what is necessary to compete economically on an international playing field. FATCA affects every single foreign financial institution in the world and proves that the US government believes it has sovereignty over the entire world. Ultimately FATCA will affect financial institutions in the US because the IRS is making reciprocal agreements with other governments to exchange financial information on accounts held by foreigners and dual citizens in the U.S.
The implementation of FATCA will never raise the revenues the Treasury hopes to gain. Instead, it will create a poisonous atmosphere for Americans trying to make overseas investments and will reduce foreign investments in the U.S.
Kyla4u: As an expat, I have never voted in a presidential
Re: your number 4. "I'm afraid of the I.R.S." Don't be. Voting in federal elections does not affect the determination of tax liability or tax residence. You won't get a call from the IRS just because you voted in a federal election.
Now why would you put No. 4 as part of your reasons not to vote, unless you know what we know! You SHOULD be afraid of the IRS, as the current offshore jihad is targeting US Citizens living abroad.
With ever passing day, Congress passes or proposes some new power for the IRS, like the ability to block passport renewals, a provision buried in the Surface Transportation bill. The Ex-Patriot Act to make the Exit tax more expensive. The Reed Amendment to prevent you from ever returning to visit your aging parents, FATCA buried in the Hire Act. FBAR in the 70s to prevent terrorist funding, now being used to collect draconian penalties for benign failures.
There are a lot of reasons to fear the powers Congress bequeaths to the IRS. Fear is a reasoned response to real threat to your tranquility living abroad.
With FATCA, the IRS now has the power to require the entire world's financial community to search you out and report on you. Who is to say, that tomorrow Carl Levin won't add an amendment to some unrelated bill to give the IRS power to match voting records of Expats with FBARs or 1040 submissions?
Trust them? Not me.
FBAR_Compliant: Re: your number 4. "I'm afraid of the I.R.S." Don't
Current tax policy and its effect on Americans Abroad is likely the single biggest issue for Americans resident outside of the US.
I will vote. I am a registered Democrat, but sadly, President Obama has lost my vote. I am also a victim of the OVDI program, which due to poor design, imposes life altering financial penalties on US citizens overseas who were filing both foreign and US tax returns, but unintentionally made a paperwork footfault. In spite of repeated calls by tax practitioners, victims, journalists and others for a modification of the program to onsider these benign actors, caught in anet meant for big fish, President Obama has acted like the Emperor in the children's fairy tale "The Emperor and his New Clothes" and ignored
Innocent_Abroad: Current tax policy and its effect on Americans Abroad is
President Obama, Secretary Geithner, Commissioner Shulman, Senator Levin, Senator Kerry and others Democrats have destroyed the lives of U.S. citizens abroad. They dusted off the dormant FBAR laws to fine U.S. citizens living abroad for having bank accounts in their country of residence. They enacted FATCA which will make if difficult for U.S. citizens to have access to even basic services. The administration of the OVDI program has been on a par with the worst of the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. The effect of all of this that renunciations of U.S. citizenship have been soaring under the viciousness of the Obama administration. The Obama presidency has made me ashamed to be an American Citizen. I suspect that there will be very few U.S. citizens abroad who will vote for Obama. Obama's best hope is that that enough U.S. citizens living abroad will have already renounced - making them ineligible to vote. This is all in the context of the promises that "Candidate Obama" made to U.S citizens abroad.
In 2008 Independents and U.S. citizens made Obama president. In 2012 independents and U.S. citizens abroad will make him unemployed.
FromPatriotToExpatriate: President Obama, Secretary Geithner, Commissioner Shulman, Senator Levin, Senator Kerry
I won't be voting in this round because of the point that Ms Serrato raised. However, I will be donating to GOP candidates, including the presidency. It is important that we reduce the number of Democrats in power. Candidate Obama made very encouraging promises to expats in the 2008 campaign and the Democrats Abroad used the Grassley/Bush tax hike on Americans Abroad (TIPRA) as a get-out-the-vote incentive to drive the GOP out of power.
Then President Obama went after us with a meat cleaver. He pulled out the obscure FBAR law and then used the OVDI to trick us into admitting to crimes so that he could confiscate our retirement savings.
The Democrats have introduced horrifying assaults on Americans Abroad that reduce the liberty and infringe on the human rights of all Americans, on or off shore. These include Stop Tax Haven Abuse, FATCA, the Passport confiscation act, the Ex-Patriot act and their budget proposal included a proposal to wipe out the FEIE (Tierney and Honda).
The GOP are not our friends, but they are the enemy of our new enemy.
I am happy to see the presidency of the Dems Abroad in Canada, but that move is too little too late. Now, the voice the Democrats will hear is the sound of the GOP cash register.
zuludogm: I won't be voting in this round because of the
Those who are registering to vote should be aware of the recent changes in information requests on the 2011 voter registration cards from overseas before you decide to vote. Questions about an overseas voter's intent to return are being asked that open you to risk of being considered a State resident and therefore subject to State taxation even though you pay taxes overseas. See American Citizens Abroad (ACA) recent article on this at, http://www.aca.ch/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=515&Itemid=49.
Mserrato: Those who are registering to vote should be aware of
This assists to clarify that Americans abroad are not represented by the State where they registered to vote, meaning that we are only represented by the US president who also does not represent our interests, meaning that taxation without representation is indeed the situation. Americans fought a war against taxation without representation, and now many US politicians are heavy advocates of such. At the going rate, this may give Americans abroad two choices: renounce and/or declare war like how our Founding Fathers did so before us, ironically as it is.
Daniel_Kuettel: This assists to clarify that Americans abroad are not represented
I personally like President Obama and would be pleased to vote for him. However, myself and many Americans abroad have been victimized by the vigorous application of FBAR penalties as advanced by the members of his party and his Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner.
Many of us have written eloquently to the President and the Treasury Secretary asking them to change this discriminatory policy. To date, we have been ignored by this administration.
If the President does not address this, I will have no choice but to vote against him.
Stephen_C_McCarthy: I personally like President Obama and would be pleased to
Ms. Buchman
President Obama did not live up to the commitments he made to Americans abroad when seeking campaign donations from overseas Americans during the previous presidential election. And that is putting it lightly, in fact his government has betrayed Americans abroad through punitive and invasive fiscal policies.
Americans abroad are not tax cheats. They are not tax dodgers. They are not millionaires. They want an end to citzenship based taxation. They want FATCA repealed. They want to be treated with the honor and respect due to America's best goodwill ambassadors.
Show some pluck, write an article outlining Mr Obama's precise commitments to the people of the 18th largest "State" outside of America.
j_ai_deux_amours: Ms. Buchman President Obama did not live up to the
Boy, Caitlan, you are going to have a hard time to convincing a lot of US Expats to vote for Obama this time around, as he has broken or ignored all of his pledges to Americans Abroad in 2008.
Are you aware of FATCA and FBAR and the havoc that is playing on the US Expat community? If you say FWhat?, then we have a problem Scotty. Google it.
The past 3 year IRS jihad by the IRS against Americans living abroad has had it impacts, and it is leaving many angry and fearful. You have lost those votes for sure.
If you don't know what I am talking about, then should google this:
Tax Advisory Panel member Jane Bruno has written another strongly-worded letter to the President about IRS policy on enforcement of the FBAR and “voluntary disclosure.”
That will tell you all you need to know why you have lost many many Expat votes.
FBAR_Compliant: Boy, Caitlan, you are going to have a hard time
I am for President Obama and want to see him re-elected. But I believe that for him to the votes from Americans Abroad he must address the issue of how these Americans are being treated by the IRS.
DIstressedman: I am for President Obama and want to see him
I am a Democrat and want President Obama re-elected. But I am concerned that the way his IRS is treating Americans Abroad, considering them criminals until they prove otherwise with endless forms and reports, he will lose a lot of their votes. I am hoping that he will address the Americans Living and Working Abroad. They are not the same as the Americans living in the USA who are hiding investments in foreign banks. I am a contributor to President Obama´s campaign, but he has to do his part in conquering our votes as he did in the previous election.
DIstressedman: I am a Democrat and want President Obama re-elected. But
The banks in the European country where I live are treating American citizens as a "persona non grata". My banking relationship of a dozen years was recently terminated due to the sole fact that I have US citizenship. As this unwelcoming environment has resulted from US law changes under the Obama administration, I cannot imagine that I will vote for Obama and I expect that this is the general view among other US citizens in this country.
CCM1960: The banks in the European country where I live are
Every thing Obamas´s government is doing to Americans Abroad have its consequences. My son who is dual citizen and lives in the USA got a good job offer to work in New Zealand. He turned it down because he doesn´t want to be an American Abroad (that is, a criminal according to Obama-s IRS). My son in law who has a Green Card was ready to become an USA citizen, and be proud of it. No longer. He will remain with his Green Card and will drop it when and if he decides do leave the Country. Just two small examples of what is coming.
DIstressedman: Every thing Obamas´s government is doing to Americans Abroad have
Australia represent! Thanks to Dems Abroad for all their hard work. Already did my registration for this - been telling all Americans I know who live overseas to make sure they're registered to vote :)
Peek-a-chu: Australia represent! Thanks to Dems Abroad for all their hard
The money advantage will be the biggest factor as usual in this election followed by voter suppression and voter fraud all of which will make Romney extremely hard to beat.
Countess: The money advantage will be the biggest factor as usual
Add to this the fact that, as taxpayers, we have precisely zero representation in the U.S government and we are allowed to receive exactly zero benefits from our tax dollars that we pay... well, all I can hope is that Romney understand that the seven MILLION expats living abroad are ambassadors for the US, creating wealth, investment, business and employment for millions of citizens living at home in the US. President Obama seems to have missed this point.
P.S. I voted for Obama in the last election.
Based on this, I cannot with a clear conscience say that I would vote for President Obama again (Yes, I voted for him the first time around).
The implementation of FATCA will never raise the revenues the Treasury hopes to gain. Instead, it will create a poisonous atmosphere for Americans trying to make overseas investments and will reduce foreign investments in the U.S.
Now why would you put No. 4 as part of your reasons not to vote, unless you know what we know! You SHOULD be afraid of the IRS, as the current offshore jihad is targeting US Citizens living abroad.
With ever passing day, Congress passes or proposes some new power for the IRS, like the ability to block passport renewals, a provision buried in the Surface Transportation bill. The Ex-Patriot Act to make the Exit tax more expensive. The Reed Amendment to prevent you from ever returning to visit your aging parents, FATCA buried in the Hire Act. FBAR in the 70s to prevent terrorist funding, now being used to collect draconian penalties for benign failures.
There are a lot of reasons to fear the powers Congress bequeaths to the IRS. Fear is a reasoned response to real threat to your tranquility living abroad.
With FATCA, the IRS now has the power to require the entire world's financial community to search you out and report on you. Who is to say, that tomorrow Carl Levin won't add an amendment to some unrelated bill to give the IRS power to match voting records of Expats with FBARs or 1040 submissions?
Trust them? Not me.
I will vote. I am a registered Democrat, but sadly, President Obama has lost my vote. I am also a victim of the OVDI program, which due to poor design, imposes life altering financial penalties on US citizens overseas who were filing both foreign and US tax returns, but unintentionally made a paperwork footfault. In spite of repeated calls by tax practitioners, victims, journalists and others for a modification of the program to onsider these benign actors, caught in anet meant for big fish, President Obama has acted like the Emperor in the children's fairy tale "The Emperor and his New Clothes" and ignored
In 2008 Independents and U.S. citizens made Obama president. In 2012 independents and U.S. citizens abroad will make him unemployed.
Then President Obama went after us with a meat cleaver. He pulled out the obscure FBAR law and then used the OVDI to trick us into admitting to crimes so that he could confiscate our retirement savings.
The Democrats have introduced horrifying assaults on Americans Abroad that reduce the liberty and infringe on the human rights of all Americans, on or off shore. These include Stop Tax Haven Abuse, FATCA, the Passport confiscation act, the Ex-Patriot act and their budget proposal included a proposal to wipe out the FEIE (Tierney and Honda).
The GOP are not our friends, but they are the enemy of our new enemy.
I am happy to see the presidency of the Dems Abroad in Canada, but that move is too little too late. Now, the voice the Democrats will hear is the sound of the GOP cash register.
Many of us have written eloquently to the President and the Treasury Secretary asking them to change this discriminatory policy. To date, we have been ignored by this administration.
If the President does not address this, I will have no choice but to vote against him.
President Obama did not live up to the commitments he made to Americans abroad when seeking campaign donations from overseas Americans during the previous presidential election. And that is putting it lightly, in fact his government has betrayed Americans abroad through punitive and invasive fiscal policies.
Americans abroad are not tax cheats. They are not tax dodgers. They are not millionaires. They want an end to citzenship based taxation. They want FATCA repealed. They want to be treated with the honor and respect due to America's best goodwill ambassadors.
Show some pluck, write an article outlining Mr Obama's precise commitments to the people of the 18th largest "State" outside of America.
Are you aware of FATCA and FBAR and the havoc that is playing on the US Expat community? If you say FWhat?, then we have a problem Scotty. Google it.
The past 3 year IRS jihad by the IRS against Americans living abroad has had it impacts, and it is leaving many angry and fearful. You have lost those votes for sure.
If you don't know what I am talking about, then should google this:
Tax Advisory Panel member Jane Bruno has written another strongly-worded letter to the President about IRS policy on enforcement of the FBAR and “voluntary disclosure.”
That will tell you all you need to know why you have lost many many Expat votes.