RNC to join Rand Paul’s fight to protect privacy of Americans overseas
New initiative could help GOP woo 2016 voters abroad
By Ralph Z. Hallow
Wednesday, January 15, 2014
Hoping to attract American voters overseas in time for 2016, the Republican National Committee is poised to join Sen. Rand Paul’s fight to restore privacy rights and financial relief to nearly 8 million U.S. citizens living abroad, The Washington Times has learned.
The Republicans Overseas project would make a concerted effort to register citizens abroad as GOP voters while the RNC steps up pressure to reverse a legal provision that Democrats pushed through Congress in 2010 that stripped Americans overseas of certain financial privacy protections.
A resolution to repeal the law has already won the support of key RNC committee members and is slated for a vote during the party’s annual winter meeting later this month. Key Republicans told The Times it could finally give the party a leg up in the race for overseas votes that Democrats have dominated in recent years.
The issue involves the controversial Foreign Accounts Tax Compliance Act that the Democratic-led Congress enacted in an effort to end tax dodging by U.S. nationals abroad.
Critics say the law’s changes empower the IRS to obtain bank account information of overseas Americans from foreign banks without a warrant and levies new regulatory burdens and banking costs upon U.S. citizens abroad that give them a powerful incentive to renounce their citizenship to save money.
Mr. Paul has fought a lonely battle to pass legislation that would reverse some of those provisions. The RNC effort goes further, seeking an outright appeal of the law.
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