Word: I don’t normally write about politics right here, and I’m not assuming everybody studying this agrees with me. What I do assume is that we’ve all felt, at one level or one other, that our elected officers must understand how we really feel about the way in which our nation is being run. This essay is extra about what it really seems wish to take part in democracy as each a French and US citizen, at a second when each citizenships appear to want defending.
As you could know, I’m each a citizen of France and of the USA.
Some would possibly see twin citizenship as a kind of “double your pleasure, double your enjoyable” Doublemint gum fantasy, imagining all of the locations on this planet you could possibly journey, stay and work whereas possessing each US and European passports. However in observe, twin citizenship means double the rights together with double the authorized, political, and monetary obligations.
It additionally means a dedication to defending two democracies, particularly when issues don’t appear to be stepping into the best path. Given the present state of the world, I’ve been attending extra political protests and marketing campaign rallies over the previous few months than museum expositions and wine tastings.
Democracy by its very nature is a participatory sport, not one thing accountable residents watch from the sidelines.
With that gauntlet thrown, what does that seem like for Americans dwelling outdoors the US proper now? And what’s it wish to be a French citizen in an election yr?
PART 1: American Citizenship in Motion
Citizenship Doesn’t Finish on the Border
For me, dwelling overseas doesn’t imply I’m not affected by US politics, legal guidelines, or present occasions. In fact I can see what’s taking place on the information.
However I additionally speak every day to shut family and friends members I’ve in Minneapolis, Arizona, Washington DC, New Orleans, Philadelphia, Texas, California, and New York. I do know what they’re going by, and the way they’re affected by current occasions.
Regardless that I’m dwelling outdoors the US, I’m additionally instantly affected by the choices of the present administration. Over the previous two months, I’ve watched as lawmakers in Congress try to move laws that would have an effect on two of an important rights I’ve as an American: my citizenship, and my proper to vote.
For all of those causes, I don’t wish to merely wait to vote within the US midterm elections. I really feel that it’s pressing to take motion now.
Along with voting, there are two different straightforward methods to take part within the democratic course of:
- Talking to our representatives in Congress
- Talking out publicly by protests or the press
And whereas it is likely to be a bit extra difficult, US residents can nonetheless do this stuff from France, too.
Contacting My Representatives in Congress to Defend Absentee Voting
Most individuals are glad to vote for his or her Congressional representatives as soon as each few years and depart it as much as them to craft the legal guidelines that have an effect on our lives. However if you would like your senator or consultant to understand how you need them to vote on any given challenge, the best manner is to allow them to know by calling or writing to them instantly.
Whereas France has 11 deputies and 12 senators in Parliament who instantly signify their constituents dwelling overseas, within the US we’re represented by the senators and representations of the state and county the place we final lived or voted.
My “house” constituency is Hennepin County, Minneapolis, Minnesota, the place I’ve been a registered voter since 1994. Since transferring to France, I’ve voted by mail, ensuring to register in time for primaries and ship in my absentee poll.
Voting in particular person would require shopping for a flight to Minneapolis, because the US doesn’t present voting facilities at embassies or consulates just like the French authorities does for its residents overseas.
A couple of weeks in the past the Home voted for the SAVE America Act, which is framed as banning voting by non-citizens, one thing that’s already unlawful. Whereas circumstances of unlawful voting are infinitesimally small, the variety of US residents who may very well be unable to vote due to this regulation is critical, significantly married ladies whose names don’t match their beginning certificates, voters who don’t have driver’s licenses or passports, in addition to residents dwelling overseas who might face new boundaries to absentee voting (particularly these of us registered to vote in Minnesota).
I don’t at present have a sound US passport. It expired this yr and prices $130 to resume (not together with the price of official photographs and registered courier delivery). Usually this could be an administrative inconvenience I might delay till my subsequent deliberate journey to the US since I can journey anyplace else on this planet on my French passport. However US residents are required to make use of their US passport to enter or depart the USA. In the meanwhile, I’m not keen to buy each a passport and an airline ticket merely to solid my poll.
Regardless that the Senate has already made it clear they may block the SAVE Act, Trump is threatening to bypass Congress with an govt order to push it by earlier than the November midterms.
Which means I’ll need to renew my passport and purchase an airline ticket now “simply in case”. However not everybody has entry to a “Plan B” like I do.
Not That France Does Every little thing Higher, However…For the report, I’m not against voter ID. It appears completely logical. But it surely additionally appears logical that each citizen receives a free, government-issued photograph ID like we do right here in France. Not everybody has a driver’s license or passport, however in France, everybody has an ID card. That administrative selection solves the issue with out discrimination.
I assumed my congressional consultant in Minneapolis is likely to be taken with listening to my ideas in regards to the SAVE Act, so I known as her workplace.
Should you’re in France, you don’t even need to pay for an extended distance name, as a result of Democrats Overseas France have offered an area French quantity that forwards your name on to the US Capitol switchboard in DC totally free: 07 55 53 64 46
After I known as and spoke to my Senator’s assistant about my issues concerning the SAVE Act, I made a easy level: if US residents can not vote from overseas, we shouldn’t need to pay taxes from overseas both.
The phrase might have been coined 250 years in the past, however I believe most of nonetheless imagine within the revolutionary motto, “No taxation with out illustration!”
Protesting Like a(n Unpaid) Professional to Defend the Democracy
I haven’t been dumping any tea into the Seine, however over the previous yr I’ve attended a number of protest marches with my fellow Individuals in Paris.
Protests and demonstrations occur virtually every day in France. Ninety-nine p.c are peaceable, registered upfront with native authorities, and coordinated with native police to redirect visitors and escort marches.
Collaborating in a single is seen as a part of civic life, not outdoors it. They’re a manner for the residents to precise themselves and blow off slightly steam till the following elections. Regardless of the casseurs who nonetheless present up on the greatest protests to trigger hassle, most marches are attended by folks of all ages and backgrounds, even households.
I obtained a crash course within the French artwork of le manif’ quickly after I first arrived in Paris within the fall of 1995. Huge protests and nationwide strikes paralyzed the town for nearly three months: no public transport, no mail, no trash assortment, no air visitors controllers. I used to be learning political science on the College of Paris that yr, so I used to be experiencing the French political system I used to be studying about in actual time!
Through the years, I’ve participated in protest marches and demonstrations in Paris for varied causes and grievances (even when – like all Parisians – I additionally generally discover them actually annoying and disruptive).
So for me it’s solely pure that I might attend protests with my US compatriots right here in Paris after I wish to ensure my voice is heard, even throughout the Atlantic.
I’ve attended a number of “No Kings” demonstrations to remind everybody that the US Declaration of Independence was an inventory of grievances in opposition to a tyrannical king, not a “to do checklist” for the elected leaders of a democratic nation.
I’ve additionally attended a number of protests to share my ideas on ICE’s immigration enforcement and deportation practices, in solidarity with my pals again in Minneapolis. The latest one was on the Place de la Bastille on Valentine’s Day, an angry-but-peaceful demonstration, with singing and a vigil for these killed by federal brokers. The small crowd was principally made up of Individuals and some curious passers-by who stopped to pay attention.
In late January, I made a decision to take part in an “undeclared” protest in entrance of the Institut de France (the gold-domed constructing throughout from the Louvre which homes the Académie Française). Simply two days earlier than, the French press leaked the information that Peter Thiel, the anti-democracy tech billionaire and co-founder of Palantir, was going to be talking at a non-public occasion there on January twenty sixth. “Undeclared” means nobody had time to register the protest upfront with the Préfecture de Police, so technically we didn’t have authorization to be there, however we confirmed up anyway.
A few of you could keep in mind how protest authorization turned a flashpoint through the Gilets Jaunes demonstrations that started within the fall of 2018: they got a allow to carry their protest on the Champ de Mars in entrance of the Eiffel Tower, however determined to march down the Champs-Élysées as an alternative. Thus ensued the internationally televised clashes with police as they approached the President’s Elysée Palace with Molotov cocktails in hand, and in later protests managed to invade and vandalize the Arc de Triomphe. Flash grenades, batons, water cannons, tear fuel, and flying cobblestones brought on accidents on either side. However not one bullet was shot, even when police have been fully surrounded and attacked.
However there can be no cobblestone throwing on the Institut de France (or I wouldn’t have stayed). Our protest in opposition to Peter Thiel was simply one other angry-but-peaceful demonstration of public opinion with the standard megaphone speeches, chants of discontent, and some hastily-drawn “Palantir Out” indicators (all in French; I didn’t discover another Individuals there). Police allowed us to complete saying what we got here to say, however shaped a protecting wall between us and the constructing simply in case.
I don’t know if Thiel heard us chanting (or cared). This protest was extra about drawing consideration to his anti-democracy beliefs, his weird Antichrist predictions, his out-sized affect on geopolitics, and the way his Palantir surveillance expertise is getting used all over the world. Earlier than this protest and the next articles within the French press, most individuals in France had by no means even heard of Peter Thiel.
At the least now he gained’t have the ability to sneak round behind closed doorways in France with out nearer public scrutiny. I credit score public protest for the win, regardless of how small.
Twin Citizenship and the Danger of Compelled Selection
In any case these protests and demonstrations, we share photographs on social media to point out everybody within the US that we see them, that we stand with them, and that we’ll be holding our authorities to account come election day.
That’s assuming we are able to nonetheless vote.
Along with the SAVE Act, there’s one other regulation proposed in Congress – the Unique Citizenship Act – that will require Individuals like me with twin citizenship to formally select one nationality inside a six-month window, or lose our US citizenship robotically.
Regardless of spending greater than half of my life in France, being American is an integral a part of who I’m, and never simply because I’ve by no means been capable of lose my American accent.
Whereas some Individuals might select to depart their Americanness behind once they to migrate overseas, I wish to assume I’ve represented my house nation effectively throughout my many years right here in France. I do my half in serving to dispel the parable that we’re all “ugly Individuals”, a lot in the identical manner my Secrets and techniques of Paris has been serving to my fellow US residents perceive and admire the French past the standard “impolite Parisian” clichés.
Other than the emotional dimension – you would possibly as effectively ask a toddler to decide on a guardian – my life in France can be very tough with out my French citizenship. I’ve been capable of set up a enterprise, make a dwelling, and construct a household right here with out worrying about continually altering visa renewal necessities. My taxes are going in the direction of my retirement and healthcare advantages.
And most significantly, as a voter I get to have a say in how these appreciable French tax contributions are spent, as a result of the American in me will say it once more: “No taxation with out illustration!”
In fact, that doesn’t imply I’m not ALSO paying US taxes.
In Case You Missed It: The IRS is Your BFF…FOREVER
To start with of this text, I hinted in regards to the rights and obligations of twin residents.
However the one obligation for anybody with US citizenship – regardless of the place on this planet you reside – is to the USA Inside Income Service.Most Individuals don’t notice the US is the one nation on this planet in addition to Eritrea that taxes its non-resident residents. However that’s not all. For the reason that passage of the Overseas Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) in 2010, US residents like me face banking and funding restrictions that truly price us cash and restrict alternatives. You’d assume this could create an enormous monetary incentive for twin residents to willingly relinquish our US citizenship. However, like many Individuals overseas, I settle for these burdens as a result of even when I don’t have to be American, I nonetheless select to be American.
I’ll all the time be a patriot, loyal to the US Structure and what it stands for, regardless of who occurs to be occupying the White Home.
I might be terribly heartbroken if the Unique Citizenship Act passes into regulation and I’m pressured to make that selection.
PART 2: French Citizenship in Motion
You Can’t Escape US Politics by Shifting to France
Even when I needed to completely immerse myself into my French life and ignore what’s taking place again within the States, that’s probably not attainable anymore. US politics have all the time dominated international headlines. Over the previous yr, they’ve more and more intruded into French politics as effectively.
Shortly after Thiel’s look in Paris, deputies within the French Nationwide Meeting known as out the French firm Capgemini for offering surveillance and monitoring expertise to ICE. Public outcry led the corporate to announce the sale of its US subsidiary lower than a month later.
There have additionally been reviews that a French Justice of the Peace was pressured by Trump administration lobbyists to overturn the fraud conviction of far-right chief Marine Le Pen so she might nonetheless run for president in 2027. Regardless of her appeals, the French courts have upheld the responsible ruling.
In France, there may be strict regulation and oversight of election marketing campaign financing: former President Sarkozy simply spent three weeks in a jail cell for election finance fraud and stays below home arrest for the remainder of his five-year sentence if he loses his attraction.
As I’m continually reminded by a detailed pal who works for the French Judicial Police, French magistrates have principally obtained a selected regulation diploma and handed a aggressive examination to change into a choose or district legal professional; they’re not elected or political appointees like within the US.
In France—no less than for now—there are penalties for breaking the regulation, even for those who’re a strong politician or cultural determine.
That features former French Cultural Minister Jack Lang, who resigned from his newest place as president of the Institut du Monde Arabe after French authorities opened an investigation into attainable tax fraud and offshore funds linked to Jeffrey Epstein.
Privateness and safety legal guidelines are additionally a lot stronger in France. Politicians or information pundits who unfold blatantly false and damaging lies – similar to Holocaust denial, or declaring all ladies are enemies of the state who ought to be despatched to breeding gulags – are closely fined.
Expertise platforms don’t get a move: Elon Musk has been summoned to testify at French authorities hearings about his X platform illegally extracting person knowledge (Europe has legal guidelines in opposition to this) and for permitting Grok AI to generate and share photos of bare youngsters and “nudified” ladies.
The stress between American and French political norms made headlines once more this week when the US ambassador Charles Kushner was summoned by the French overseas ministry for “breach of diplomatic protocol”. Kushner, the father-in-law of Ivanka Trump, is a convicted felon who was serving time for tax evasion, unlawful marketing campaign contributions and witness tampering till his 2020 pardon by Donald Trump, who appointed him ambassador to France in 2025 regardless of having no diplomatic expertise.
After the US embassy in Paris retweeted a US State Division message claiming “violent radical leftism is on the rise” following a lethal conflict between extremists in Lyon. After he refused to look to his first summons, the Overseas Minister Jean-Noël Barrot introduced he was proscribing his entry to senior French officers.
The episode was extraordinary not as a result of ambassadors by no means disagree with host governments, however as a result of the disagreement performed out so overtly. Issues about American partisan rhetoric creeping into French home politics have been everywhere in the French information packages this week (surprisingly, that is how a few of my American pals dwelling right here found who our present Ambassador is).
Watching all this unfold has solely strengthened my conviction that we’ve to battle for the democracy we would like, or we’ll find yourself with the democracy we deserve. Which brings me to what that accountability seems like on my finish, as a French citizen.
Exercising Citizenship Regionally in France
As quickly as I obtained my French citizenship, I instantly registered to vote. Not solely do I’ve an official French Carte d’Identité to point out on the voting station, I additionally obtained a cute little voting card that they stamp after you’ve deposited your poll within the urn, like a voting passport.
I’ve even been a volunteer poll counter in French elections, the place we nonetheless use little items of paper in envelopes. They’re counted on the spot by volunteers and representatives from all political events at every voting middle, with outcomes tallied and introduced earlier than anybody (or any poll) leaves the room. It’s fairly hack-proof.
I stay within the thirteenth arrondissement of Paris, the place for the previous three years I’ve been taking part in weekly meetups with the native Horizons members (the centrist political social gathering based in 2021 by one in every of Macron’s former Prime Ministers, Édouard Philippe). We focus on neighborhood points (highway works and bike lanes come up rather a lot), host visitor audio system (an MEP got here to clarify how the European Parliament works earlier than the EU elections), or go to area people organizations (final month it was a pupil meals financial institution). We additionally distributed flyers across the neighborhood to encourage folks to come back to a meetup and be taught in regards to the comparatively new Horizons social gathering.
That’s how I obtained concerned. I used to be handed a flyer outdoors my meals market by Pegah Malek-Amadi, the younger girl who organizes the Horizons meetups for the 13th arrondissement. We bonded instantly over our shared alma mater (College of Paris 2 Panthéon-Assas) and our household ties to Arizona, the place I spent most of my childhood. Pegah’s household fled the Iranian Revolution in 1979; her dad and mom got here to Paris, the place she was born, and her aunt and uncle settled in Arizona, the place her cousins have been born.
Though I had voted in a number of French presidential elections, I doubt I ever would have gotten concerned in native French politics if I didn’t have this private connection. I admire Pegah’s sincerity and willingness to do the exhausting work of bringing so a lot of her neighbors – of various ages, backgrounds, and pursuits – collectively every week to speak and debate about native points. I solely want I had gotten concerned in my area people’s politics sooner.
Municipal Elections and Native Candidates
Paris is now getting ready for subsequent month’s hotly contested municipal elections to exchange outgoing Socialist mayor Anne Hidalgo. The Horizons mayoral candidate is Pierre-Yves Bournazel, with the official assist of Macron’s Renaissance social gathering. Fred and I attended final week’s rally on the Cirque d’Hiver (insert political circus jokes right here), the place each Édouard Philippe and former Prime Minister Gabriel Attal gave speeches on his behalf.
He’s at present polling third, behind Socialist Emmanuel Grégoire on the left and Tradition Minister Rachida Dati on the best, however forward of the candidates on the far left and much proper. With a half-dozen critical political events and two rounds of voting the place alliances can shift, outcomes are genuinely tough to foretell (though that doesn’t cease everybody else from doing it anyway).
Paris additionally elects mayors for every arrondissement. Right here within the thirteenth, our tireless chief Pegah is working below the Horizons banner. It’s unusual and thrilling for me to see how the problems we’ve been discussing amongst ourselves the previous three years are actually listed on her platform. I do know that is how politics works, I’ve simply by no means been a direct participant in it earlier than.
For the previous few weeks I’ve been serving to Pegah’s marketing campaign, handing out flyers with the opposite volunteers at my Sunday open-air market and talking to the dad and mom dropping their youngsters off on the faculty on my road within the mornings. As somebody who has by no means canvassed for a politician, it’s a bit terrifying doing this in any respect, not to mention in French!
However I’ve been fortunately stunned at how many individuals are keen to cease and speak, even when we disagree. It feels so….civilized. And a lot extra satisfying than “liking” or “sharing” one more meme on social media. For somebody supposedly so expensively schooled in political science and taken with being a “good citizen”, I’ll admit I’m embarrassingly late to the sport on this one.
Whether or not my most well-liked candidates win or not, I’m glad I’ve participated in my small manner. I hope by sharing this I can encourage a few of you to step out of your consolation zones and take the time to get extra concerned, regardless of the place you reside and vote.
GET INVOLVED: If You’re a US Citizen in France
Should you’re a US citizen in France, there are many methods to become involved, whether or not it’s serving to folks register to vote by the non-partisan VotefromAbroad.org, becoming a member of protests organized by Indivisible Paris or Paris In opposition to Trump (the following “No Kings” protest is March twenty eighth), or attending Democrats Overseas Paris occasions just like the Tuesday morning Stroll & Discuss strolls, the place we hear first-hand in regards to the upcoming votes happening within the US and necessary laws proposed in Congress. Should you desire to maintain a low profile, anybody can take part within the Resist & Unsubscribe motion from the privateness of their very own house anyplace on this planet. There are additionally non-partisan lobbying teams that battle for the rights of US residents dwelling overseas, similar to ARRO and the ACA. Lastly If I’ve missed something right here, do let me know.
I began this essay saying we most likely don’t all agree, and I nonetheless imagine that’s okay. What I hope we share is the intuition to do one thing reasonably than nothing. Should you’re discovering your individual methods to take part — or for those who’re nonetheless making an attempt to determine the place to begin — I’d genuinely love to listen to about it within the feedback.
