VA Foreign Medical Program Up 263% but Delays Overseas Direct Deposit
The VA Foreign Medical Program, the Department of Veterans Affairs benefit that covers overseas care for service-connected conditions, paid $128.3 million to 8,024 veterans and providers in fiscal 2024. That’s a 263% rise in reimbursements since 2018. The program is...
Americans moving back to the US after failed stints abroad have become common enough that financial advisers coined a name for them, a July 2026 Barron’s report finds: boomerangs. The report builds its case on interviews. It leaves out the...
A Scottish employment tribunal ordered PizzaExpress Limited to pay an American waiter £5,469 (approximately $7,100) in compensation for racial harassment after a colleague told him to “go back to your country you [expletive] Yank” during a shift at the chain’s...
Youlin Chen, an American seismologist detained in China for more than 600 days without trial, faces espionage charges that carry sentences up to life in prison, his wife and two hostage advocacy organizations disclosed this week. Chinese state security officers...
The Internal Revenue Service published 1,462 names on its latest quarterly list of US citizenship renunciations, covering the first quarter of 2026. That’s a 13.8% increase over the same quarter of 2025, and the second-highest quarterly total in the past...
EU residence permits for Americans rose in 2024 even as the bloc handed out fewer of them to almost everyone else. American citizens received 80,424 first residence permits across the 27 EU countries, up 1.9% from 78,911 in 2023 and...
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FATCA Enforcement Misses the Wealthy as Americans Abroad Lose Bank Access
FATCA enforcement was built to expose Americans hiding money in offshore accounts. A Treasury watchdog report released Apr. 8, 2026 says the IRS still isn’t turning its data on the highest-balance nonfilers into cases. The reporting burden the law created, meanwhile, keeps landing on ordinary Americans abroad, including people who just need a bank account where they live. What the watchdog found The 2026 report is the latest in a series, and its title is blunt: the IRS has not successfully addressed the highest-balance FATCA nonfilers. It identified more than 400 high-balance nonfilers flagged through FATCA data. The IRS referred 164 for possible examination and examined 12, assessing about $41 million in additional tax, the report found. Another 241 received letters that carried no penalty. The pattern is not new. A 2022 audit of FATCA enforcement laid out the gap in full. When Congress passed the Foreign Account Tax Compliance
British Citizenship for Americans Hit a Record 2,654 Applications in Early 2026
British citizenship for Americans drew 2,654 applications in the first quarter of 2026, the highest quarterly count in 22 years of Home Office records.
Overseas Voters Win in Court but Still Lose Ballots to Delay
Overseas voters have become a target in the run-up to the 2026 midterms, but the legal fight and the real barrier point in different directions. The Republican National Committee has filed or backed lawsuits in Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Virginia and, in late June, Colorado, challenging state laws that let certain Americans abroad vote. On April 6, 2026, the RNC sued Virginia, asking the court to cancel existing registrations
Residence-Based Taxation Bill Stalls on a Missing Revenue Score
Residence-based taxation is the reform millions of Americans abroad have waited on for a decade, and 2026 was supposed to be the year it finally moved. It hasn’t, yet. The Residence-Based Taxation for Americans Abroad Act, first introduced by Rep. Darin LaHood, R-Ill., in December 2024 as H.R. 10468, expired when the 118th Congress ended. LaHood and Sen. Todd Young, R-Ind., have spent the past year rewriting it. The updated
US Citizens in Iceland Reached 1,113, Up From 583 in 2016
US citizens in Iceland reached 1,049 in 2025, up 80% from 583 in 2016, while American long-term permits tripled to 247. What the small-base numbers show.
