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The State Department has cut the fee Americans must pay to renounce their U.S. citizenship by roughly 80%, lowering the cost from $2,350 to $450 under a new rule that took effect Friday.
The new fee, first announced in 2023 but not previously implemented, returns the cost to the same level the government charged when it first began requiring payment for citizenship renunciations in 2010.
The State Department said in the rule that it lowered the fee as a policy decision to reduce the cost burden on people seeking a Certificate of Loss of Nationality, the document issued after someone formally renounces U.S. citizenship before a diplomatic or consular officer abroad.
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The State Department raised the fee from $450 to $2,350 in 2015 in part to cover administrative costs as the number of Americans seeking to renounce their citizenship surged following new U.S. tax reporting rules for expatriates, The Associated Press reported.
Applications to renounce citizenship rose sharply in the early 2010s, climbing from 956 cases in 2010 to 3,436 in 2014, the State Department said.
The department said the new $450 fee remains well below the government’s actual cost of processing renunciation requests. The State Department estimates roughly 4,661 people apply each year for a Certificate of Loss of Nationality.
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Lowering the fee is expected to reduce annual federal collections by about $8.9 million, the State Department said in the rule. The money collected from the fee is deposited into the U.S. Treasury and is not used to fund the State Department’s consular operations.
Renouncing U.S. citizenship involves a multistep process that requires applicants to appear before a U.S. consular officer abroad and confirm in writing and verbally that they understand the consequences before taking a formal oath of renunciation, The Associated Press reported. The State Department must then review and approve the request before issuing a Certificate of Loss of Nationality.
Stricter financial reporting requirements imposed on Americans living overseas — including rules tied to the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) — have contributed to renunciation requests in recent years, the department said.
The increase in the fee drew criticism from advocacy groups, including the one that represents people who hold U.S. citizenship primarily because they were born in the United States but have lived most of their lives abroad, the AP reported.
The group filed lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the fee, including one case that argues there should be no cost at all to renounce citizenship, according to the AP.
“The Association of Accidental Americans welcomes this decision, which acknowledges the necessity of making this fundamental right accessible to all,” the organization’s president, Fabien Lehagre, said in a statement.
Lehagre said the decision follows years of legal advocacy by the group.
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The association said that since the State Department announced plans in 2023 to lower the fee, at least 8,755 Americans paid the full $2,350 cost to renounce their citizenship, the AP reported.
The State Department has not released updated figures on the total number of Americans who have renounced their citizenship.
