The initial House version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act contained a tax on remittances that, if it had been adopted, would have been highly problemtic for overseas Americans. As the bill went through successive revisions, the remittance tax was progressively scaled back. The version of the tax that was finally signed into law on July 4, 2025 is a pale imitation of the inital version. It will likely pose a problem to few, if any, overseas Americans.
SEAT co-founder Laura Snyder discusses the remittance tax in a short, recently published article in Tax Notes.
The article can be consulted via SSRN at this link.
An abstract of the article:
The various versions of One Big Beautiful Bill contained a tax on remittance transfers. This article compares the different versions of the tax as it was modified in each version of the bill. If it had been adopted, the House version of the bill would have been highly problematic for overseas Americans, among many others. The final version as contained in the version signed into law on July 4, 2025 was dramatically scaled back as compared to the initial House version, but still victimizes the undocumented and the unbanked. It especially victimizes the intended recipients of remittance transfers – the poorest of the poor.
