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Comment by prostoalex | Hacker News Reader

Unless one renounces their US citizenship, they're still subject to IRS and US courts. Department of State also suggests that it doesn't clean the slate as far as financial burdens are concerned https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/legal-considerati...

"In addition, the act of renouncing U.S. citizenship does not allow persons to avoid possible prosecution for crimes which they may have committed in the United States, or escape the repayment of financial obligations, including child support payments, previously incurred in the United States or incurred as United States citizens abroad."

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It is one way ticket, obviously. Student loans would not be enforceable in foreign country, after personal bankruptcy.

But if the lender sues in a US court and gets a judgement, isn't the person subject to an extradition? The lender doesn't have to sue in respective country's court.

Never heard of extradition for civil judgements. The thought sent a chill up my spine. I do know -- from a friend -- that the US and some other countries have signed a treaty for reciprocal enforcement of child support.

Extradited for debt? I don't think so - I think it has to be criminal (but IANAL).

There are countries that don't have extradition treaties with the US for anything, though many of them are places you might not want to live...

I am not an American, nor have I ever dealt with the American court system. However, extradition is, to the best of my knowledge, only used in serious criminal cases, and not used at all to enforce a civil judgement (which suing would be).

Wikipedia also has a list of countries that the United States doesn't have an extradition treaty with. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extradition_law_in_the_United_.... Most of those don't look like great options, but a few of them are quite nice!

Surprised to see Andorra on that list!

They would only be able to seize assets you might have left in the US. Extradition is only for criminal cases.

Whether or not a country will assist at all in enforcing a civil judgment from a foreign jurisdiction is a matter to be explicitly spelled out in treaty agreements.

Your best bet for avoiding a civil judgment is probably to just be too difficult for a process server to find to serve you with the complaint and summons, or failing that, to make a special appearance to assert lack of jurisdiction before making your answer.

IANAL. While I'm not particularly inclined to offer helpful advice to those who would try to skip out on valid debts, I am even less inclined to allow the typical institutional lender or debt collector to go about their business as usual and win by default.

Extradition?! Of course not. Extradition is for criminals. A judgment on a debt is in civil court.

Failure to pay child support is a crime. Depends on the kind of debt.

Not extradite but I imagine they may ask the local courts to enforce debt collection based on the civil judgement in the US. I've heard there are agreements with other countries to collect child support so it isn't a stretch to believe they may help collect other debts through the local court system.

More and more countries are hostile to US citizens. The US applies all sort of pressure, especially on banks, to deny them bank accounts and others.

I had a friend who was born in the US, while his parents were on vacation, so he automatically got US citizenship even though he never lived there. And dealing with banks in his "real" home country was becoming more and more difficult. He was even forced to file taxes with the IRS, even though he literally lived in the US for the first 2 months of his life at most.

So, even if it's a one way ticket, just the fact that you have US citizenship can make daily life a little complicated .

Citizenship does not really work that way. I suspect your 'friend' was exaggerating things somewhat!

He would have been granted whatever citizenship his mother had, by that country, since he lived there while growing up. Any rights or penalties associated with the US citizenship would only come into play if he actively sought them out, having first gone to a US embassy and explicitly obtained citizenship for himself. Generally the only reason to do that is if one intends to move to and live in the USA.

And I believe that most countries do not share citizenship databases (as opposed to passport databases), so it would not be noted.

It absolutely does in the U.S., if you are born in any U.S. territory you are automatically a U.S. citizen and do not have to do anything to further establish it beyond that point.

It does work that way in the US, don't patronize me. When someone is born on US soil, they automatically get US citizenship and US birth certificate from the hospital.

This is a very common problem for people who acquired US citizenship this way, I encourage you to use Google instead of calling people liars.

Welp. Having just read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accidental_American all I can say is that the USA is insane...

You don't even have to declare bankruptcy, just stop paying.

I had a teacher in High School who had stopped paying his UK student loan (he was in New Zealand), he had no plans on ever going back.

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