Transcript of the above video: 

I am going to preface this video by saying, those who are interested in at least some level of analysis with regard to how these developments are going to impact Tax matters here in Thailand for expats, especially American expats, I'm making another video contemporaneously with this one, where I go into some of the analysis for that. But I want to get this on the record with regard to just basically the news of this. This is a big deal; this is as big a deal as the OECD thing we talked about last week; Trump pulling out of OECD citing the fact that it's “extraterritorial”, all sorts of problems. I personally hope that Thailand takes a page from the US's book, looks at the analysis regarding the extraterritorial issues associated with the OECD. And frankly, I hope Thailand rejects it out right because I don't think we need these problems here in Thailand. 

That said, in another huge piece of news coming out of the US, it looks like Trump is at least freezing, if not actively firing all of this IRS personnel that Miss Yellen, the prior Treasury Secretary seemed to have put into place in furtherance of her dream of this Global Minimum Tax - I don't know where she came up with this dream; she might have come upon it while tripping on mushrooms with Xi Jinping up in China -  but whatever, she came up with this notion that there's this Global Minimum Tax that we're all supposed to be subject to, apparently by dint of being born, which is complete nonsense and antithetical to the very foundational basis of the United States, but let's leave that aside for now. It looks like Trump is basically reversing yet another insane idea from a bunch of frankly midwits at best that occupied the prior Administration. 

That said, I thought of making this video initially after reading a recent article in the New York Post that is nypost.com, excuse me, the title is: Trump says he may send nearly 90,000 newly hired IRS Agents to border after issuing indefinite hiring freeze. Quoting directly: "President Trump said Saturday he is considering sending nearly 90,000 newly hired Internal Revenue Service Agents to guard the Southern border..." Good job sir. That is a good allocation of, in my opinion, unduly repurposed resources. If these folks are getting a salary and they want to continue to do so, why don't you go on down and help out at the Southern border? How about you do that rather than bothering people who are trying to create value and create a livelihood for themselves? Why don't you go actually help the country. Not try to suck out all the sustenance from the people who are actually the citizenry. Just a thought. Quoting further: "..just days after he issued an indefinite hiring freeze on the Federal Agency. The 47th Commander-in-Chief told a boisterous crowd of supporters that he could also fire the IRS employees.." - great, good. I mean the good news just keeps rolling in with Trump. The good news train just keeps rolling in to good news station. Quoting further: "..many of them and salaries funded by the 72 billion provided for the Federal Agency under the "Inflation Reduction Act".." which I put in quotes. 72 Billion!  I'm constantly, every time I've been thinking about this whole issue around what I'm calling them "Stamp-Pimps" here in Thailand, these "enrolled agents" all of these agents of the IRS, my first question has been, "well who's paying these people?" Well 72 billion would provide a lot of salaries. Now I'm not sure that that's what is happening, but I have to ask the question, and I keep thinking of MC Hammer. I wonder out there if anybody can find a photo of Trump and MC Hammer together. But one time somebody asked MC Hammer how he went from having like 50 million dollars in one year to being completely broke? And MC Hammer's answer was, "it's the entourage. I had a payroll; I had to pay for all these people." I think this is what we're looking at with regard to the IRS. They have created all these stamp-pimps; they have sent them out under subterfuge, calling themselves enrolled agents, whatever else, but I think they are subsidizing all of these people with this 72 billion bucks, nobody wanted by the way, in an Act called the “Inflation Reduction” Act which just spent a bunch of money, so I don't know how exactly that reduces inflation. Meanwhile, a bunch of the money got spent on paying a bunch of stamp-pimps’ salaries it looks like to me. Well it looks like Trump is rolling all of this back. Quoting further: Quote: "They hired, or tried to hire, 88,000 workers.." - and this is quoting Trump himself - quote: "They hired, or tried to hire 88,000 workers to go after you and we're in the process of developing a plan to either terminate all of them, or maybe we'll move them to the Border," he said during a rally at Circa Resort and Casino in Las Vegas." Quote: "I think we're going to move them to the Border where they are allowed to carry guns. You know, they're so strong on guns. But these people are allowed to carry guns so we will probably move them to the Border." Yeah, the IRS agents, the people that are going to come collect money, bang us over the head, the citizenry were giving guns. Meanwhile the past Administration used to go on and on about the terrors and horrors of guns but when it's their Tax Authority, they have no problem arming them all up. Well Trump's right. If you are all armed, go down to the Border, help out. You want to make a federal salary, go don't help the country. Stop coming after us and that includes expats. I am very hopeful there are ramifications for this - in fact I think that there are - positive ramifications for this for tax purposes for expats here in Thailand. Again I get into that in another video made contemporaneously with this one but it's worth noting, this is not just coming from the Executive Branch, the Legislative Branch has chimed in as well.

Going over to waysandmeans.house.gov, that's the Ways and Means Committee of the House of Representatives. These are the folks that deal with Tax matters. Quoting directly from a recent press release: "President Trump's Cease and Desist to IRS Protects Middle Class Families and Small Businesses from IRS Audits and Weaponization." I would tack on to that, "and hopefully expats too". Just us middle class folks who just don't happen to live in America for whatever reason, why do we have to get banged over the head worse than folks that live in America? Because it happens sometimes depending on the factual scenario. That said, quoting directly: "President Trump is answering Americans' fears of a supercharged Internal Revenue Service (IRS) with an executive order halting the hiring of Federal employees until his Administration determines that it is in the National interest to do so." Wow, I haven't heard that phrase in a while, National Interest, finally. Good to see an Administration actually cares about or at least knows the term exists. Quoting further: "This includes curtailing the onboarding of tens of thousands of new IRS agents called for by Democrats in the so-called Inflation Reduction Act. In supporting the President Trump order, Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith from Missouri issued the following statement: Quote: "President Trump's cease-and-desist order to the IRS is a crucial step to helping middle-class Americans and small businesses living in fear of 87,000 new IRS agents targeting them with new audits and monitoring their personal transactions. Democrats have said all along that they will ramp up audits on Americans every year to squeeze as much revenue out of them as possible." Does that sound like anybody to you? Like the stamp-pimps telling everybody that they have got to pay something when they may or may not, even be under the jurisdiction of a given Tax Authority. And by the way, these are IRS agents coming to Thailand operating in violation of Thai Law regarding the restricted occupations of foreigners. We have agents of the Internal Revenue Service doing that right here. Quoting further: "Democrats have said all along that they will ramp up audits on Americans every year," - yeah again, every year. This is the kind of talk that they come at us with. And there's a certain point where you just have to say, "enough, I am sick of hearing your stamp-pimp nonsense." Quoting further: "A return to ‘historical audit levels’ as sought by Democrats mean 600,000 more families making less than $75,000 would be hit with an IRS audit." There are a ton of expats that would be pulled under that as well, and I'm taking into account the foreign earned income exclusion, but again when you look at this in the grander scheme of things, that's not a huge deal. Quoting further: Quote: "Even the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration revealed that the Agency had put zero safeguards in place for low- and middle-income taxpayers to protect them from audits.." - and to protect expats from stamp-pimps I might also note. Quoting further: "..despite having had two years to do so. So, the American people elected President Trump to be that safeguard, and he is stopping this scheme dead in its tracks. Quote: "And it's a good thing, too: More invasive audits from the tax collector would be ripe for abuse given that the agency has been out of control. Not only has the Agency been providing political cover for Democrats by delaying and now phasing in an unpopular 1099-K reporting scheme where 90% of the burden falls on taxpayers making less than $200,000 and target's gig workers and small businesses, but activists at the IRS leaked sensitive data about political opponents - including President Trump himself. The Biden Justice Department sought only a slap on the wrist as punishment, which would hardly deter future criminal behaviour." Yeah, that's the thing. You don't know what all these people are going to do. There are 87,000 of them that they were talking about, they'd run all over everywhere and cause havoc. Just getting rid of them is the way to do it; just nip it in the bud. Quoting further, quote: "Congress fought to rescind new funding intended for new auditors at the IRS as part of the Fiscal Responsibility Act. The American people overwhelmingly supported this move and gave President Trump a mandate to end the weaponization of the Federal Government and to cut the bureaucracy. Now he's taking action." Great to see. Good to see Mr. Trump doing this.

I couldn't be happier. I think this will have negative ramifications for the so-called Stamp-Pimps which I couldn't be happier about as well. As noted previously in this video, I think this will have tremendous ramification for Americans with regard to possible tax issues here in Thailand; I think it actually could have indirect ramifications for everyone here in Thailand from a tax standpoint. Stay tuned to this channel as we will certainly be keeping you updated as the situation evolves.