Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard - Flightless Bird: Citizenship

Episode Date: April 30, 2024

In this week’s Flightless Bird, David Farrier looks at the process of gaining American Citizenship, and what it means to become truly American. Why over the last decade did over seven million non-Americans choose to become American? And what does this process look like? David talks to a New Zealander who chose to Naturalise before looking at some Americans who’ve chosen to do the exact opposite. Why would someone choose to become American and why would someone choose to give it up? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm David Ferrier and New Zealand are accidentally marooned in America and I want to figure out what makes this country tick. I've been in America for almost three years now and those years have whizzed by in part thanks to this podcast which has seen me going on adventures all over this sprawling country. The longer I stay here the more I start to wonder about my future and what I plan to do. Back in New Zealand I have a dad getting older still eating Tamarillos Tamarillos? Tamarillos very nice yeah and occasionally occasionally I miss my tiny nieces roasting me each and every day that red light means I'm recording

so everything you just said was recorded and now it's going to be broadcast out to millions and millions of people. You don't believe me? No I don't. Why don't you believe me? I often feel like you don't believe me. Do you not find me believable? Not really. But while I still feel the pull of New Zealand I also really love it here in America. I love the vast open spaces, the chaos, and the variety of people I get to meet each day. I guess my point is, do I stay or do I go? How long do I keep getting these 3 year work visas at about $8,000 a pop? Or do I apply for a green card?

Or do I ever become an American citizen? Because if I choose to stay here Citizenship is where it all sort of ultimately leads to to me becoming a hundred percent American Over the last decade around seven million non-americans became American by getting citizenship or naturalization as they like to put it, as if it's the natural thing to do. Last year the top five countries that saw their citizens becoming American citizens were Mexico, followed by India, the Philippines, the Dominican Republic and finally Cuba. New Zealand didn't even make that list, not by a long shot.

So get ready to pledge your allegiance and wrap your naked body in the American flag, because this is the citizenship episode. Fly this bird that's down in America I'm a fly this bird that's down in America Yes, citizenship. Oh, this is fun. I'm excited for this. It's funny. It is like a big looming question in the back of my head of making that weird jump and so I thought this episode would be a good way for just me to think out the scenarios

and talk to some people that have done it and undone it and kind of feel if it's ever the right thing for me. It's scary, I feel lucky that I don't have to think about this. You're American and it's kind of sorted and America is your place. I know me, I know that this would hurt my heart to reject my home. Yeah. And I guess New Zealand is my home and I'm like, would it be doing a disservice to my country if suddenly I'm taking on citizenship in America? If I went back to New Zealand, would they murder me?

What would my parents think? Am I going to get an American accent? All that stuff. Okay. I think we have answers to a couple of those. I don't think you're going to get an American accent simply from the citizenship. In fact, I know that to be true. My dad still has his accent. Although it's come down. Has it?

Yeah, but he's been here for a long, long time. Yeah. You've been here as I've learned recently. You've been here for a long, long time. Long time as well, haven't you? As a time. Yeah. And you've been here as I've learned recently, you've been here for a long, long time. Long time as well. I was a baby. Yeah. Let's remind people of that. Let's just remind people of what happened.

So- Oh, so awful. We'd done 30 episodes of this show. And at some point in, I think it was in like a dock. I said very confidently. You said that I've been here for a long time. I came as a little baby. It's like, excuse me. I saw you, I felt a shift in the room and the energy.

And I was like, oh God, why? And I didn't know what I'd done wrong. And then, yeah, I realized that I jumped to a giant assumption that you clearly had come here as a little baby. Because I couldn't possibly, I could not possibly with this brown skin, I could not possibly have been born in this country and American. It's horrific when your assumptions are brought to light like that.

Like it's shocking. Because I'd like to say that wasn't the reason, but underneath it all maybe that was. Do you know what I mean? It had to have been. And again, you're not bad. I mean, you are bad in some ways, but in this way. Other ways.

You're not bad. Horrific. This is though such a beautiful illustration of people just make all kinds of assumptions. Yeah. You must've arrived here in the last couple of years, you know. Imagine if I'd done that. Monica, she got here three years ago to start this podcast.

Yeah. But it's funny because I like when there are cracks in the foundation. You are extremely liberal. Extremely. I think you're more than me if we're rating ourselves, which we don't need to do, but you're very progressive, you're liberal, but there are some cracks that crinkle up sometimes with you. Now there are like, I struggle listening to female vocalists.

That's the number one for me. Yeah. It's something in me is like, uh-oh. When you did the, um, what was it? Family Feud? Family Feud. Oh no. Oh no.

Yeah. No. The big wig came up to me. The producer of the whole show, probably the creator of Family Feud. And I'm like, oh yeah. What's like, isn't it supposed to be the assistant or something? Yeah, it was a woman. I just assumed. Yep. I would like to say, look, yeah, it's wild, that stuff,

when you're confronted by it, because you just realize how much of the stuff as a white man is sort of embedded in there. Even when you think you're the most liberal, open minded person of all time, it's like, oh, oh, I have these blind spots that just sit there. It's horrifying. Yeah. But it's, I mean, I think it's good because it is true that you didn't adopt those thoughts. They're just embedded.

They're there. They're embedded. And so you have to be active about fighting it. And I think very liberal people often don't do that because they think well, I'm so Progressive I'm so liberal. So of course everything I think is right. No, this is absolutely This is like entitlement that we sort of have the righteous correct path on everything Exactly, and they can be some really big blind spots. Yeah No, it's good because there's, I get it. So I'm a citizen, I'm a born citizen.

No, it's good because there's a lot of you out there. I'm an American by birth. Wow. Okay, so the main reason I would think about getting citizenship is because getting a new visa every three years is just so annoying. It costs about $5,000 in American dollars. It's time you've got back and forth with a lawyer.

I know I'm super lucky in that I get this entertainment visa. So as so many people struggle to desperately get visas here, I'm part of this workforce that can get one relatively easily if you have the money. And so I realize I'm super lucky, but it also so annoying it's so much admin I have to go back to New Zealand to do it obviously to get the little stamp on my passport all that stuff it's a pain in the ass citizenship would mean I'm just I'm in America I don't need to worry about anything yeah I'm not running the risk of getting kicked out ever so as I started poking into this topic the first thing I, I went and I met with a New Zealander who has

actually done it. Wait, real quick, real quick. Do you ever feel because you're very engaged in what's going on, because you're a journalist, so you know what's going on, you're here to call out baddies. Do you ever feel a little bit odd that you can't vote? Oh, it's really unusual. Yeah. You feel slightly powerless because I think democracy is pretty great.

And the idea that we get to have a say in who's leading is pretty great. And the thing that's weird for me at the moment is that as someone who lives and works here on a visa, I'm paying quite a lot of American tax. In California, I feel about half my income goes to the government. And yet I don't get any kind of say in who that government is. I find that pretty awful.

That doesn't feel like the way it should be. If you're getting a lot of my money, then I should get a little say in who's getting that money. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, I do. I think in that case, it would be a lot harder to even come here for work though. They would not just let anyone come if they could vote.

100%, yeah, there's a lot of barriers in place just in general in society here until you can vote. That's a big, giant issue. And saying that, I'm putting off doing an episode of Flightless Bird about the political system here because it's so confusing to me and whenever I start looking into it I'm like, oh how could I make this episode interesting in general for people that already know it but also how do I wrap my head around it because I look at voting papers, even

local councils and that kind of thing and it's so complicated. It is so complicated. It is so complicated. It is, yeah. Do you generally vote on all the things or just like the big ones? It's a lot of paperwork. It is. I mean, once you're registered, it's easy.

For a lot of people, being able to register is a big hurdle. Not for me, because I'm privileged. Yeah, so it's not too bad. I also do mail-in often. Uh-huh. Which is easy. So that's getting like ahead of the trend a little bit. That's, you can do it earlier when you mail in or is it just? Yeah, and you don't have to go stand in line.

Like that thing is nice. I'm so annoyed because some states don't do it and that- Which cuts a lot of people out. Exactly. It's just immediately people who are working, they can't do it or they can't prioritize it. It's a huge way to suppress voters and I find that really horrific. I really, I do need to do a flightless bird, find a fun way into talking about politics and voting.

And even a big arc of the last Caribbean enthusiasm season was Larry David giving water to someone who is in line to vote and apparently in that state you can't give people food or drink while they're in line because I think the idea could bribe them to voting in a certain way. And so the whole season, the whole arc of the season is Larry David going on trial for doing this good deed. That's hilarious. Oh my God.

I can only assume that's a thing. And there's certain things here that are just really unusual and odd that the idea of giving water to someone is somehow illegal. So state by state, and that's a move. It's a move to stop people from voting. We do not have that here in California. In the 2016 election, Kristen and I went and gave doughnuts out to people in line.

Oh, amazing. I love that. We were wearing Hillary shirts. Yeah, so you were like being very clear in like, you know, what you're doing and who you're supporting. Every state is so, so different in how they operate. It's wacky though. There was a video that I got really captivated by recently where, and we don't, this gets really like dark and weird so you don't really need to go into it too much,

but before they were gonna vote on an abortion ban, they had one of the senators on the floor praying and speaking in tongues, which if you're not familiar with evangelical Christianity, just sounds like a lot of gobbly-gook and chanting and they're all in a little circle and I was watching it going yeah American politics also much talk of separation of church and state and yet this is happening it's really weird it's unusual. You're right it really is so embedded in the policies and the way people vote even though technically they're meant to be slightly separate. Anyway, look, New Zealand's got its own issues as well. It's not just America, but America is unique.

And so part of becoming a citizen, yeah, I'd get to vote and I'd get to swing in with my liberal politics and change the country one vote at a time. And make sure there's no more female singers. Hey, I've still been listening to Taylor Swift by the way. You have? Folklore. I've had folklore on.

No lie. Do you like it? Yeah. I do like folklore. Oh, I love this. Wow. You're going to become slowly but surely. Yeah.

She's a good buzz and I wasn't expecting that. So, so thank you for that. Oh my gosh. You're so welcome. All right. I'm going gonna play you my little documentary as I figure out whether citizenship is the thing for me or not. I've been on the United States Citizenship

and Immigration Services website, uscis.gov, and apparently I need to spend at least five years in America before I get a shot at citizenship. So that's at least another two years before I get my shot. Like all government websites, it's a shit show and my eyes start to glaze over. So I shut my laptop, get in my car, and drive to my friend Aaron's house for some first-hand information. If you recognize that song it's the Naked and Famous, a New Zealand band that had a pretty good run here in America. My buddy Aaron was in that band, it's what brought him to America a little over 10 years

ago and in America he stayed. I wanted to talk to Aaron because despite his Kiwi accent he recently became an American citizen, I wanted to know how he decided to become full American and what that process looked like. So moved over here in 2012 after a couple of years of touring. And yeah, we got to the end of our first album cycle and thought, where do we wanna land?

And LA just seemed like a really nice sort of intermediate place to stop and settle in for a while while we figure out life. And then 12 years later, still here. How did it work as a New Zealander who suddenly decided to be in America? What visa were you on? Were you on a visa? Were you here illegally? What did you do? What was your process? It was painful to start with. We were on the US P1 visa which is a yearly visa given to performers and athletes entertainers every year you have to renew that visa and every year the question comes up

maybe I won't be allowed back in the country this year so it was a really stressful way of living for it was a solid five years of doing that. I guess I'm in a similar sort of position right now my visa lasts a bit longer it's an O1 entertainment visa which I was lucky enough to get because I do this podcast but it comes with that worry that when it expires maybe it won't get renewed and I'll be sent packing to New Zealand. Other things flip through my mind too like what if I get boozed up one night and do some crimes and get deported? What then of flightless Burrard?

For Aaron on his series of one year visas, he knew it was time for the next step. He wanted a green card. Now usually this involves a lot of paperwork and legal fees, but Aaron got lucky. Two of us in the band did the green card lottery and amazingly just got it first time. It was the most easy, simple process,

easier than any visa or anything. Just like put your name down, highest education country you're from and then within a few months it was like you've been accepted. Congratulations, you got a green card. The Green Card Lottery was set up in 1990, known officially as the much more dry diversity immigrant visa. 11 million people like Aaron apply each year from all over the world and about 50,000 get it. Aaron was lucky. Having a green card meant he had more stability in America because he was more American. But not all the way American. You still don't get to vote. You still don't get to be called for jury duty or you know,

you don't get to go to war for America. The main annoying thing about being a foreigner on a green card in America and something I hadn't really fully clocked until now is that you can lose that green card. If you leave America for more than six months immigration can just take it away from you and you're back to square one. So seven or eight years of working towards it if I'm gone for more than six months I could be right back to square one again. So after getting the green card Aaron knew it was time for citizenship, which ended up being relatively straightforward, somehow from a lawyer, a lot of forms,

but easier than getting any of the visas he'd applied for over the last decade. It felt too easy to not follow through on. I remember talking to the officer and she was like yeah our backlog for getting a green card is like one or two years right now but oh you want citizenship? That waits only three weeks. Maybe no one wants to be a citizen right now I don't know but it was really chill. Aaron said the hardest thing was probably just memorizing a hundred American facts for the official test. I guess to become American you mainly just have to act like you're back at school and memorise some facts you'll never use again.

So what does that look like? Is it like going into the DMV? You're on a little computer answering these questions. What's that like? That's pretty much it. You go down to the federal building, you have an appointment time, you sit down with an officer, they ask you a whole lot of questions. They pick from that hundred questions, you know, ten or so things to ask you about the country yeah you feel like you're kind of in trouble almost it's quite intimidating. How many are you allowed to get wrong before you're out the door? I think you have to get six out of ten. Do you have to like do a pledge to the flag or do you have to sort of burn your New

Zealand passport what's the step there? You got a pledge we all stood outside had to raise a hand repeat after me. I pledge allegiance I Don't remember the rest of it And then you get your big certificate that says yes to pick it up naturalization I think is the word they use and then that's it a few weeks later a shiny American passport turned up with his name On it and just like that my New Zealand friend Aaron became my American friend Aaron. The only two changes I've noticed have been coming back in to America.

You don't have to go in the really, really long line for visitors. Jealous. I fucking hate that line. Yeah, and instead the officer says to you, welcome home, rather than giving you a look like, what are you doing here? Get out of here. Aside from that and getting my first jury duty letter in the mail like within a few months. But otherwise life has just continued exactly the same way just with the peace of mind of knowing that I'm good to be here. I found myself thinking about what Aaron's New Zealand parents made of their son becoming an American.

There's a certain scepticism New Zealanders have about America, and I wonder how that played out. You nailed it perfectly. It was exactly that. It was mum and dad who every year ask, is this the year that you're moving home? They don't respond so nicely when you're like, hey, here's a photo of my US passport, check it out. By the way, I might have to go to war if they ask me. I'd never thought about the war thing when it came

to becoming a citizen the possibility of conscription in some future world war. I hadn't thought about a lot of this stuff and hearing from Aaron's parents I wondered what my parents would make of it. Hello David. Hello father, how are you? I'm all right, here we are, how are you? Hi mum. Hello. After some small talk, I cut to the chase. I'm putting together an episode

about people getting their US citizenship. I was wondering what you would think if I ever ended up getting American citizenship and becoming an American, what you'd think about about that? Well it would require a bit of time for us to think about that David. No I mean David, I mean that's a decision you make for yourself. Do you think it would be a good idea or a bad idea? I wouldn't have a clue, I wouldn't have a clue. To be honest it didn't really sound like my parents cared that much about whether I ever got citizenship or not. All they really wanted to talk about was the electronic Aura photo frame I gave them for Christmas. Here's some

seamless product integration coming right up. Now the other thing you know those photos that are on our bench that you put through can you make it go faster? Oh yeah I can I can definitely make the Aura frame speed up a little bit. How about I change it to change every eight minutes? Okay, that would be good. Perfect. How was that? I was really proud of that sponsor integration. I mean, that's a free one for Aura. I don't think they've been paying for that. I don't either.

So I feel like we can't use it. We got to bleep it. Man, that was cute. They don't seem to care. No, they didn't really care. Kudos to my parents. They are always sort of like, Oh, do you want to do that? Okay, that's fine.

They never really get excited about anything. They don't get distressed about anything. They're just sort of like, okay. Do you think once you were pretty vocal about like not being religious anymore, they just feel like, you know what, do what you're going to do in this life? I think that's probably when they realized, oh, he's an adult now. He's sort of making his own decisions. And to that credit, they were like, oh, we're not going to pester him forever. He can just go and do his thing which is really nice. Yeah that is. Because I was trying to get into medical school once upon a time when I left

that to go to journalism school I think a lot of parents would be like oh god this is such a letdown but they again they were just sort of their attitude was okay journalism school okay we're not gonna have a rich doctor's son. We're gonna have like a poor scroungy, horrific journalist child. With pink hair. You have pink hair right now. I do. It's going a bit more strawberry blonde now.

What they don't tell you when you dye your hair pink is that, or any color, is that the dye washes out. What did you think? I thought when you dye your hair, Monica, I thought the dye adheres to the hair and sticks, but I've got pink all over my white towels. I've got pink bed sheets. It's a mess.

That's bad. Did you go to a salon? I went to a salon and I got it bleached properly. But it was sort of an organic kind of salon. So maybe that organic hair dye comes out more than regular hair dye? Probably. No, you need those chemicals. I need the chemicals in there.

I didn't like the burning sensation with the peroxiding. That felt quite intense. Have you ever had your hair peroxided? No, God, no, no. Can you imagine? Can you imagine if I... Sort of can. I'd like to see you with some blue hair or something.

You blonde Barbie blonde. That would be amazing. No, my hair has been dyed one time. It was for the herbal essence commercial I did as a mermaid. And they just dyed it the same color. It was the same color. It was black. They added a shine. Oh, just slightly shiny and more mermaid-esque black. Exactly.

But that's the first and last time. Wow. Yeah, well, I really like having pink hair. You were tricking everyone because on Instagram you had pink hair filter for a while. Yes, that's how it started. I did a pink hair filter and I like that people, a few people got very confused and were like,

oh my God, your hair is pink. Even though I also had freckles all over my face. When I turned my head, the filter would glitch, but some people were like, oh wow, it's pink hair. Then I thought for something fun, why not just make it real and then really trick people. You're such a trickster. They're going to evaluate this for your citizenship. It's something I have been thinking about is the things I've sort of put out there, the pink hair,

everything I've tweeted and Instagrammed. They go through all of that stuff. And I wonder what it would take for them to go, this guy is not American enough. This podcast should do it though. I'm making an entire show every week about becoming more American. This has got to help. I assume it would help, but you're right. It gets complicated because if you're outspoken about things that are potentially whatever quote anti-American. Yes. Totally. Will that affect it?

God, I don't know. My guess honestly is yes. It's the thing like technically freedom of speech should protect it, but then when you think of the people flicking through the application form, I even think when I come into America and apply for my visa, I have to add my social media. So it wants to know my Twitter handle, my Instagram handle. They're looking for that for a reason. Of course, but I feel very conflicted about this

because as an American, I'm like, fuck yeah, freedom of speech, everyone should be able to say what they want and I think we should be critical of our country. But if someone, not you obviously, but like if someone was very vocally anti-American, saying they hate America, if I was making the decision about who can come in,

I might be like, and not in a petty way, in a, well, is this person gonna do something here? Is this person a danger? Because then if something happens, you look at the record, it's like, duh, duh, this person was going to do it. It's kind of like, you know, I hate to make this comparison, but you know, the kid in Michigan who brought the gun to school and like killed people, it was very clear he was going to do that. Yeah. It's that rare case where the parents are now incarcerated, right?

Because all the signs were there and they didn't do anything. They didn't do anything. It's kind of like that, right? Where, well, of course he's going to go do something bad. He's saying he's going to. Yeah, there's that. And I think even on a more simplistic level, so many people want to come to America for a better life. And if there are people desperately wanting to be here and to make themselves a different life, I want those people to get it as opposed to someone who's moaning about how terrible

it is. Let some positive people in, you know? Yeah, I guess. It's complex. Something Aaron brought up that I hadn't thought of was the idea of being conscripted and that's not a thing that's happening now, but obviously where I am right now, I could just flee back to New Zealand.

If I'm a citizen and some world war breaks out, then yeah, I'm strapping on a gun or whatever futuristic weapons we have and I'm off to war with you by my side, me and you off to war. Oh, I'm gonna- Dax and Rob. Rob's kids were all off to battle. Oh, I'm gonna- Dax and Rob. Rob's kids were all off, you know, to battle.

Yeah. What if you become a citizen and then America and New Zealand go to war? What would you do? I think Pam and Alistair, my parents, I think then they might have more opinions on things. Would you kill some, even though you're an American? You might switch sides

Look, I still feel very strongly about New Zealand And I think I would find it really hard to go to war against New Zealanders And I think I could be the one Monica that could potentially turn on you. Oh It would be awkward because you're also my friend, so that's tricky, but you're American. But if we're going into gun down a whole lot of New Zealanders in some futuristic battle, then I'm going to struggle to do that. I'm sorry. I know. I get it. Just watch out.

You might get a little knife in the back from old Davey. Stabby stab. Oh, my God. I don't like this. To be fair, I think this isn't something we're going to have to worry about, much like a snake being in the path. I'm starting to feel like you've laid a lot of track over these past 60 episodes. Of turning on you very quickly. Yeah.

Yeah. And I feel like that idiot who is like, well, no, he's just saying that. But wow. Actually, speaking of snakes, because it made it clear that I wouldn't kill a snake for you if it was in front of the path, which you took exception to. I actually saved someone's life last week because there was a big rattlesnake on the path at Griffith Park. Oh my God. I was just in the middle of the path literally lying there.

Oh. There was a couple that had, actually quite weird, there are a couple but they both had headphones in, so they're sort of ignoring each other, which is quite weird when you think about it. But they were marching up and I see the snake there and I stopped by the snake, because I was just like, it's amazing, it's a snake there. I was like, God, are they going to stop, are they going to see it?

And I ended up having to yell at them. I go, stop! Really dramatically. Oh my God. Because they're about to step on the snake. No, no. They didn't see it. They weren't thinking about it.

They were so engaged. Probably listening to Taylor Swift. So engaged in the music. They're probably listening to this podcast. They probably were. Yeah, but they didn't see the snake. So I actually saved a life last week. I mean, I don't like to talk it up too much, but I did save probably were. Yeah, but they didn't see the snake. So I actually saved a life last week. I mean, I don't like to talk it up too much,

but I did say probably two lives because there were two of them heading towards the snake. I yelled and I stopped them. What did they do? They looked shocked. They were amazed. They were very grateful. They said, wow, thank you, Sarah.

You know, you're wonderful. Thank you. You're an angel on earth. You're an angel on earth. We would have been dead without you. Mainly they were just so shocked. They just couldn't believe that they're about to step on this thing.

Okay, so I'm proud of you for that. Now, did you just step over this, like how'd you get past it? Did you or did you turn around and go back down? I went around. I sort of did a hop and a jump and sort of went around and it was okay. I'm very agile on those tracks, Monica,

like a mountain goat. That was a big risk. These rattlesnakes are very quick. Yeah, this was a big one actually. It was a big one, but I'm brave. What can I say? I'm a brave guy, so it's okay. Did the couple turn around and go back down?

They went up the hill around it a little bit. There was enough in the path where they could kind of get around it without too much risk. Wow, you guys are nuts. I would be running back down the mountain. Yeah, or expecting me to club it to death with a large branch or something. We know you're not doing that. You've made that clear.

You made that very clear. Stay tuned for more Flightless Bird. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsors. Support for Flightless Bird comes from Aura Frames. Mother's Day is coming up. Moms love their kids, you guys. Yeah, they do. Or their grandkids.

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for your ideal hotel or vacation home, no matter where you go in the US. Book whoever you want to be on booking.com. Booking.yeah. ["The New York Times"] So something else, when I was thinking about this, booking.com, booking.yeah. So something else, when I was thinking about this, I talked to Aaron, and I was like, okay, this is a process. Citizenship actually sounds, after you've been through the visa process, relatively easy. So I know if I want to get citizenship, okay, I can do that. But then I thought to myself, what about the opposite? What about Americans that don't want to be American anymore?

What are those people doing? Whoa. And so this is where we go now. Wow. If it's one thing I've learned during the 41 years I've spent on this rock hurtling through space, it's that everything has an opposite. While one person likes horror movies, another likes a rom-com. While some of us like cats, others love dogs. If you're Monica, you love neither.

What good is the warmth of summer without the cold of winter to give it sweetness? said American writer John Steinbeck. So in this episode about non-Americans wanting American citizenship, of course there's an opposite. Of course there are Americans who don't want their citizenship. I am no longer a U.S. citizen. There is a long process involved with that. That's Alan, an American who is no longer American. I moved to New Zealand in 2008 during the Bush era. And whenever somebody asks, what's the reason why you moved to New Zealand, the first one is the obvious one that everyone says, who comes from the US, Lord of the Rings.

I had gone on holiday to New Zealand while I was doing my masters and loved it. It was the first time, you know how Americans have this very quintessentially self-focus of greatness, this notion that they grow up in the greatest country in the world? Well, it was the first time I was ever able to directly observe how some other country did something better than where I grew up. And not just one thing, but many things as far as I was concerned. I can feel some Americans getting angry at this, but please remain calm and remember that this life is full of opposites. While Alan left America, I arrived. Remember Steinbeck,

what good is the warmth of summer without the cold of winter to give it sweetness? New Zealand was this sanctuary almost in my mind that I needed to get to if I was going to stay sane. Alan came to New Zealand on a school shortage visa. New Zealand needed him basically. And after being in New Zealand and becoming a permanent resident, he decided he didn't need to be an American anymore. He lived in New Zealand now.

And like how I'd quizzed Aaron about becoming a US citizen, I wanted to know what the process was for becoming un-American. Surprise surprise, it's mostly just money. You will be required to pay $2,350 US dollars. You pay that upfront regardless of how it goes. That's money just tossed away. It was like the equivalent of 4,000 New Zealand dollars when I paid it. Then you get to go up and play the lottery with the guy who sits behind the desk and listens to your tale of why do you want to renounce your U.S. citizenship. And as you can imagine, with Americans being the real patriotic, wonderful people that they are,

to suggest that you wish to renounce your U.S US citizenship is a bit of a slap in the face or they want to make it seem like that but my heart rate before and after was so peaked way above where it was supposed to be. It's surreal. I remember a similar feeling when standing in the line at the US Embassy in New Zealand trying to get my US visa. Just the panicked feeling of a big life change. We live your identity being so far out of your control. But Alan was successful. It's like New Year's Day versus New Year's Eve. There's no real difference. The grass doesn't turn blue. All of a sudden at midnight sort of thing. You don't even get handed the

piece of paper that says you are no longer a US citizen at that point. That's two to four months down the track. So how does it feel? It feels ambiguous. But at the back of my head, I'm like, okay, I've done this. I no longer have to worry from this point on about anything that I do having an impact on Uncle Sam finding out about it. It's so strange to feel like you're being spied on or judged really in a way by your government. I know that that's commonplace for people from certain parts of the world, but if you grow up in a place that tells you it's the best part of the world and then that's how you feel about it, it's hard to reconcile. All this talk of spying and judging makes Alan sound paranoid, but he's not.

America really likes to know what its citizens are up to, and that's for one main reason. Again, surprise surprise, money. The US is one of only two countries in the world that taxes everything you do, regardless of what country you did it in. If you're an American and you leave America, you're still taxed by America. Even if you're working in New Zealand and getting paid in New Zealand dollars, America taxes you. The other country Alan mentioned that does this is Eritrea, a country in East Africa.

That's the real amazing thing. For so long people like me, I thought, well, what are they going to do? I live in New Zealand. I have no intention of ever returning to the U.S. If I never step foot back on U.S. soil, what are they going to do to me? Turns out they have basically grabbed most every other country by the balls, financially speaking, and have made it a requirement that those countries report you to the US. Again, there's a temptation to think he's exaggerating, but he's right. I know this because it happened to me.

As I spent the last few years in America and started paying US taxes, I got an email from someone called Factor, who apparently worked at my bank in New Zealand. Factor sounded like a spam name to me, so I seemed to snarky reply because I'm a child and I threw it in my junk folder. But this Factor person kept emailing me and emailing me some more, and so I googled Factor and found Factor wasn't a person but the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act. Someone tasked with policing this act had noticed I was now living in America and they were now watching my money back home in New Zealand.

So all of your accounts, anything you have financially, has to be reported through FATCA. So if FATCA was chasing me and New Zealand earning money in America, of course they'd chase one of their own who'd left. It was enacted in 2010 to try to target non-compliance by US taxpayers using foreign accounts. So basically anybody living abroad trying to hide their income or anything that they're doing really financially speaking. So the US has kind of strong armed the banks around the world in these different countries by saying, okay, well, we're going to put this into effect in 2014, but we're going

to give you a grace period until the 1st of January 2020. And you don't have to report all of the accounts of any person with American citizenship to us until then. And so for many of us, we just kind of existed in this sort of state of like, wow, not so bad. What's the big deal? But the penalty that they make on it is that banks around the world are now on the hook under FATCA for a 30% penalty for every dollar they earn from the U.S. If they have not properly reported a suspected account held by a US depositor or do not have

a reported social security number for that depositor. So they have skin in the game. And so a number of banks have started trying to close suspected US citizen accounts because of this because it's not worth the risk. With all this in mind, if you're an American renouncing your citizenship, there's one reason you can't give for doing it. The thing you've got to realize is if you renounce your U.S. citizenship, there is one reason and one reason alone you cannot ever give, and that is I'm renouncing because I

don't want to pay U.S. taxes anymore. It's illegal to do that. While working on the story, I spoke to a bunch of people like Alan. Americans had left for New Zealand and then run into this tax issue. This is Suzy. There's a thing called the Reed Amendment, which means that they think you left for tax reasons. You can be barred from ever entering the states again. Let me preface this by saying 90% of my American friends in New Zealand do not care. They do not file the US taxes.

They go la la la la la. Even the ones who do file them don't follow the rules. No one cares but me. I care because I'm a rule follower. But the compliance of that is I have to file my taxes every year, which costs me between two and 12 grand US every year to file my US taxes. Does that sort of chase you around for the rest of your life? Is there any way you as an American can ever get away from that despite you never going back to America? You're not

making any American money? Nope. And if we sell our house here in New Zealand I'd have to pay US capital gains. Suzie did end up renouncing her American citizenship, not for tax reasons of course. No one I talked to for this podcast who'd renounced their US citizenship did it for tax reasons. What I found interesting about Suzie is that she found the emotional process a lot harder than Ellen did. It was horrific. I had to look at the flag and read an oath. It was awful. I'm relatively well educated and I had to read this thing and I could barely understand half the words.

So I'd say here for to pursue it to section 18, 5, 19. I mean it was, and I'm bawling and I wasn't allowed to have tissues because it's in the embassy and they don't, I mean it was awful. As Americans, and I'm sure you to have tissues because it's in the embassy and they don't... I mean, it was awful. As Americans, and I'm sure you'll know this because you're over there now, you're taught that being American is the best thing in the world. That you are in the land of the promise. The thought of giving that up is so abhorrent to Americans. I still haven't told my family. They have no idea.

So, it just kind of was like that nail in the coffin that that part of my life is over. And actually, it's funny, about six months after I renounced, I got a job offer back in the States to run a summer camp that I used to run. And I have no desire to do it. Sometimes I still wake up and I'm like, oh my God, I'm not an American. And like, I feel weird about it. It's also no one has done it. I've become like this person in New Zealand that I've had a number of Zoom calls with

people who are thinking about it, but no one knows anyone who's ever done it because it's so rare. So, I'm now like the Oracle. An Oracle, but also a naughty Oracle. When she renounced her American citizenship, Suzy got added to America's naughty list. I'm not kidding. There's also the quarterly register, David. The quarterly register, it literally was done to name and shame people who've chosen to renounce. So I just found that really interesting that America is one of two countries, the other a spot in East Africa, that basically tax you even if you leave. So it's just kind of

wild to me. Did that surprise you? Cause I was sort of blown away by it. Imagine Monica, you want to go and live in New Zealand, right? You go and live with my parents or something. You work for some New Zealand company and yet all your New Zealand money is still getting taxed by America. That never ends. It sucks. Don't get me wrong. I'm more surprised that other countries don't do it than I am that we do.

Yeah, America, it's got the infrastructure to do it. When I got that email from FATCA, F-A-T-C-A, and it came from my New Zealand bank, but this division I'd never heard of, I was like, oh my God, America is aware of all my New Zealand stuff now and is asking me questions about it. It was just so unusual. I guess they've just got the resources. Yeah, definitely. I mean, the more money a country has, the more resources they can deploy. But even like European countries, I'm surprised.

I'm surprised England doesn't do this. Yeah, just America and Eritrea. Which is just, who doesn't police it at all because they don't have the resources to do it? Well, they can't. Yeah, exactly. This section was very interesting to me. I definitely found myself getting slightly defensive during it. It's your American-ness bubbling to the surface. It's my American-ness, but it's actually not.

It's the piece that isn't my Americanist but it's actually not. It's the piece that isn't my Americanist that's getting defensive. It's the fact that I have parents who had to become citizens. They renounced their country for this legit land of opportunity. And I know that's a complicated statement and there's a lot there. It's the basics of why I came here. It was for opportunity. I can be as critical as I want, but that's part of the reason I came here. Yeah. And I am so grateful they did that.

I have a lot of reverence for this country because of that. And within three generations, we've sort of done the thing and it feels really special to me that that is the case. So it's actually not my Americanness that's causing it. It's my minoritanness. It's the fact that I could have so easily not been American and I'm grateful that I am. I don't know, it almost feels like this weird privilege

to like be an American, be who knows how many generations into being an American and then just be like, this place is bad. Okay. And New Zealand is a fancy, nice country. Yes, it's special. It is a really nice place. It's a nice place.

I mean earlier, and maybe this isn't true at all, but I feel that part of the reason that the guy you spoke to who got a green card very quick is because he was coming from New Zealand. He wasn't coming from a country where a ton of people are trying to get their green card or it's not flooded. Yeah, I know a lot of New Zealanders that have got the green card lottery and that system. Yeah, they do seem to get it more than a lot. Exactly.

So you were looking at a very specific country and the immigration in and out of there. If you look at other countries, it's going to look so much different. And a lot of people leaving New Zealand, I mean, you said you came for opportunity, but it's not that New Zealand has this insane lack of opportunity. No, there are opportunities, certainly opportunities in New Zealand as well. So yeah, I guess I just hear her saying that, and I'm a little like, I'm grateful that this person participated, she sounds awesome and you know, these are her life choices, but my knee jerk is a little like boohoo, America's so bad, you

went to New Zealand. So you're like, you're in New Zealand, so you should be just happy you're in this beautiful place kind of thing. Not everyone has the ability to just go to New Zealand, this really lovely, awesome place. Totally. And she's super aware of that as well. I mean, she's the one that was bawling her eyes out when she was giving up citizenship. But both of them said this.

The reason they felt so emotional is because America does this thing to us where we are told it's the best country in the world and we are told that but I feel like that's a lot of blame on an American ethos when really I think that's just a human instinct that you are loyal to your home. I guess I'll find out if I do end up getting citizenship and I have to kind of like renounce any of my New Zealand-ness I'll be curious if I feel emotional about that because there's like a nationalism to New Zealand.

You're proud of coming from New Zealand, but I'm pretty sure it's not as strong as it is here. There's certain things about America that I wanna push into for the show that I'm kind of clocking for the first time. The ways that America does pump its American-ness up. Like jets flying over a baseball game, or having members of the military come on, singing the national anthem,

these things that do just make you feel proud to be a part of a place, that we're all part of this big thing. I think it does seep in more than it does in a lot of other countries. I think you're right. But then this tax thing's fascinating, because of course no one I talk to

renounce their citizenship because of tax no one I talk to renounce their citizenship because of tax. Of course not. Of course, you know. But that's such an unusual thing. It's made me think citizenship might not be the path for me because if I do go back to New Zealand, which is where I have family members, I don't particularly want to be paying taxes to America for the rest of my life, which I would be doing if I was an American citizen.

It's like an unusual thing to think about that I didn't know about until I researched this epi. Yeah, I totally get that. Okay, there's one other crazy aspect to this, so much so that I've done something very unusual and I've got a part three of this documentary. Wow. There's like another level of what the fuck that kind of got me so this is it. There was one final thing I discovered while putting this episode together and to be honest

it sort of freaked me out. There are plenty of examples like Alan and Susie, Americans who'd left America and chose to renounce their American citizenship for a variety of reasons, none of them being taxed. But there's another slightly more chaotic pool of Americans also wondering about their US citizenship. This is Alan again, who's become a bit of an expert on this stuff. There's a category of the people who know that they're US citizens who want to renounce

for a variety of reasons. And then there's the other category of people who don't realize that they're US citizens and now suddenly had no idea of all the responsibilities that they have incurred just for the sake of existing. I ended up talking to a few people in this position, people who lived in New Zealand their whole lives, had never set foot in America, who recently realized they're American.

That's to say, they found out one of their parents was American. Some of them knew this and had never thought about the ramifications, some only recently found out that a parent was American. All of them sounded stressed, one telling me they're struggling to save to pay their New Zealand tax bills, let alone having to think about paying the IRS as well. The people I spoke to who had never worked in America have never been to America, but they've just realized, maybe by listening to a podcast like this, that they should have been filing their US

taxes for the last 30 years. There are a lot of people who don't know that they're American citizens because, well, they've never been to the US, they weren't born in the US. Why should they be a US citizen? Well, if your parent is a US citizen, you are a US citizen by birth, regardless of where in the world you were born, and you have the exact same responsibilities as anybody who was born and bred and grew up in the US and shoots guns into the air and likes apple pie. So the fact that you aren't aware that you're a US citizen is like saying to the officer who pulls you over,

oh, I wasn't aware that it was illegal to speed through here. That's the craziest thing. This is terrifying to me. It reminds me of a recurring dream I have when I'm back in high school and it's exam time and I realize for the entire year I haven't taken the class I needed to. It's a feeling of what I'd call surprise panic. Except for if you fail your test you don't get thrown in jail. Jail's an exaggeration but then tax evasion technically can land people in prison. But one thing's clear, the American government, FATCA, definitely cares.

Now, since COVID, there's trillions of dollars of spending from the US to try to recover from COVID and a variety of other infrastructural initiatives. And that's fine, I get that. But it has to be paid for. And they don't expect to pay for it just from people living in the US. So now they have a big push to try to find as much money as they can anywhere else in the world. And that means all the people who have US citizenship living overseas who haven't been paying their taxes. If you're listening to this in New Zealand or some other country that's not America and panicking right now, the finer details are worth checking. Alan, who's been studying

up on this stuff and his journey to become an American, shared some of them with me. There are different rules about this. So if you're born in the US, you obviously are a US citizen. If you're born outside the US to two US citizens, you are a US citizen. If you're born outside the US to one US citizen, you are a US citizen. If you were born on or after the 14th of November in 1986 and the US citizen parent resided in the United States for five years with two of those five years coming after that US citizen parent's 14th birthday or the child is born before November 14th, 1986, and the US citizen parent reside. It goes on and on.

What defines if you owe the American government money or not. After that US citizens parents 14th birthday. When you look at this shit, and you're like, it's so arcane. How would you ever know this? Why would you ever expect to this? Why would you ever expect this? Why would you expect a country, like I said, there's only two countries in the world that do this, a tax worldwide income, it's the United States and Eritrea.

And I don't think Eritrea's got the, you know, no offense to any Eritreans out there, but I don't think they have the resources to try to enforce their tax policies the same way that the United States does. What I've learned in this episode has made me think a bit more deeply about the journey to US citizenship and what it means long term.

I guess it comes down in part to long-term plans and where you want your tax dollars going. It depends if you want emails from a person called FATCA who, trust me, emails you a lot about taxes until you reply. This that famous quote that probably sums this whole thing up, uttered by Benjamin Franklin in 1789, nothing is certain except death and taxes. It seems like an appropriate thing to end on, especially considering something else Alan had told me. If you're a US citizen by the way and you die in another country, even if you didn't If you're a US citizen, by the way, and you die in another country, even if you

didn't know you were a US citizen, all of your estate is taxed to the US. I guess part of being an American citizen is always, always giving America your money, no matter where you live, no matter if you're alive or dead. God bless America. They want your taxes. Gotta keep paying your taxes. Taxes are part of America. It's a part of the system here. It just is. I do think that's a pretty small group of people who don't know that they're American citizens. No, it is small. But just imagine just suddenly realizing it and go, oh, God, I'm 30 and I've been living in New Zealand my whole life.

And technically, I'm meant to be filing for the last 30 years. It's just a funny stress to have. I found it such a crazy concept. Yeah, it is. I wonder if there are loopholes or something, if you really looked into it. They're not going to chase you to the ends of the planet. It's probably just becomes difficult if you wanna go and live in America or something.

Yeah, I mean, I found this very interesting. I think it's such a fascinating topic. It affects so many people. I spoke for this a little bit. I know what we do here is to talk about a lot of the issues and stuff, but we did not hear from anyone who became a citizen. It's so grateful for that and it's changed their life.

And I would venture to say based on the people I know who've come from other countries who became citizens, that's the majority. The majority of people who come here were dying to come here. They did. It was hard and it was worth it. But you coming here as a little baby. As a little one-year-old baby. That's right.

No, you're right. Of course. No, there is definitely a whole side of people loving their citizenship and very grateful that they have it. I, as usual, took a slightly unusual angle and found a minority of people who had like a weird a very weird time. I'm glad. I'm glad we dived into that. But it is important to me that we are also sharing this country is good. There's a lot of problems with it. Don't get me wrong. But I do feel lucky to be American.

I'm just saying, I feel, I think we're very similar, conflicted about, and nothing's ever straightforward, but I also feel, I mean, there's a reason I want to live here right now and that's because I overall really like it here and I enjoy life here a lot and I like the people here are so good. I'm not saying New Zealand people aren't, but it's just, I really like it here. I bristle a lot. I like it when you bristle. I do it a lot when people compare, which we do it here. We've done it here a lot.

When we are comparing our country with other countries that are very homogenous in the breakdown of type, mainly race. So America is such an insane melting pot. It is a melting pot. Like it's such a such an insane melting pot. It is a melting pot. Like it's such a diverse man, melting pot. Yeah. I love that about this country. That is what makes it so special.

That is what gives it its fire. And that is also why we have problems. That is why I'm happy to take on the problems for the trade-off of diversity. When we're always like, oh, Sweden, Sweden, everyone cannot stop talking about these Nordic countries. I'm like, they're all white. It's because they're all one thing. So there's not going to be that inherent diversity of need, opinion, anything.

There's a reason we're polarized and we have these issues. It is the diversity. To me it's worth it. Yeah, and I think that is a cool thing that America has done is it has literally the green card lottery. It's the diversity visa and they're giving people from other countries free access to America. That's pretty bold and pretty great. Yeah. America. That's pretty bold and pretty great. Yeah. America. Anywho, America, we did become more American today. That's true.

Well, you didn't, you are stagnant. I'm not sure what way I'm gonna go. I need to think about taxes and I need to think about being conscripted into the army. I need to think about the balance of not having to apply for this bloody visa every three years. Sure. But I'll keep you across what I decide. And if I had my little citizenship ceremony, I wonder if I'll tell you or if I'll just

surprise you with my brand new American passport. No, because we want to come watch. Yeah, come along. I'll do a little speech. It'll be so fun. Pledge of the allegiance and all that stuff. Oh my gosh. I pledge allegiance.

I think I can do it. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. To the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God- I'm missing something. You're getting lots of it. Wait, they teach you this at school? Oh yeah, every morning we do. I think, we've talked about this maybe, I think it's gone.

I really want to know if people are still doing the Pledge allegiance. I think some do it some don't I think it depends on The state and the school I'm sure a few people out of that episode wrote in and like my children still do that Still do it. Okay. I think it was in California. I don't think anyone's doing that This just seems like there's better things to do than repeating the same speech again every day, right? Learn a new math problem or something. And to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice to all. I think I kind of did it. I agree. It's sort of a waste.

It does feel super nationalistic when you look at it with a bird's eye view. Like, oh my God. And there's also something sort of sweet about everyone doing the same thing at once. Totally. Team building. Just community. We're all on this team. We're all doing this.

I do like the idea of you later on today, wandering around the supermarket, or whatever, just mumbling that under your breath, like trying to get it right. whatever, just mumbling that under your breath, like trying to get it right. To the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. I'm messing it up.

It's pretty good, Monica. I'm convinced, if you weren't laughing, I'd be like, you've nailed it. You're more American in this episode than ever before. Congratulations. Wow, I love that. All right, before. Congratulations. Wow, I love that. All right. All right, bye. Bye.

Okay, bye. Bye.