Old Green Card

[GCH]

I'm hoping that someone here can help me with an unusual green card question.

I lived in the US with my partents when I was in elementary school - we moved there on a visa for a year but then got green cards through the green card lottery at the end of the first year. We stayed 4 1/2 years but then went back home in 1997 since my grandparents were sick. My dad had to stay an extra six months to finish his contract and sell the house and so he successfully applied for citizenship. The plan at the time was to return to the US in a year or so.

In the end we didn't return so I have now just discovered that I have a green card which shows an expiry date in 2002.

I've heard stories about people entering the US on a sort visit many years after a green card expires having a problem at security - being taken off and asked questions for several hours and then being asked to sign a form formally revoking their green card. I've recently started a job where I travel to the US for meetings occassionally and I'd like to avoid this, or any other problems in the future (I might want to work in the US some day).

Is there anything I should do to regularise my status? Do I really need to formally revoke a card that expired 15+ years ago? If my green card holding status has been valid all this time should I have been submitting tax returns since I was 18?

[miiki]

Have you applied for a B1/B2 visa? I’d see problems trying to enter on a waiver, but if you get permission to enter first, I’d think that you’d experience fewer problems on entry. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’d want to formally revoke your green card since you abandoned it.

[newacct]

I'm hoping that someone here can help me with an unusual green card question.

I lived in the US with my partents when I was in elementary school - we moved there on a visa for a year but then got green cards through the green card lottery at the end of the first year. We stayed 4 1/2 years but then went back home in 1997 since my grandparents were sick. My dad had to stay an extra six months to finish his contract and sell the house and so he successfully applied for citizenship. The plan at the time was to return to the US in a year or so.

In the end we didn't return so I have now just discovered that I have a green card which shows an expiry date in 2002.

I've heard stories about people entering the US on a sort visit many years after a green card expires having a problem at security - being taken off and asked questions for several hours and then being asked to sign a form formally revoking their green card. I've recently started a job where I travel to the US for meetings occassionally and I'd like to avoid this, or any other problems in the future (I might want to work in the US some day).

Is there anything I should do to regularise my status? Do I really need to formally revoke a card that expired 15+ years ago? If my green card holding status has been valid all this time should I have been submitting tax returns since I was 18?

Since you didn't submit the form to voluntarily give up your green card, and there's not been a final administrative or judicial decision that you've abandoned residence, you are still considered a "resident alien" for US tax purposes, and your worldwide income all these years have been subject to US taxes. You can file I-407 now, but that would only make you a nonresident from now on. You may be able to use the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion and/or the Foreign Tax Credit to reduce some or all of your US taxes, but you would still have to report it. There may also be a tax treaty that you can use that would "break ties" on residency and make you a nonresident for US tax purposes.