Department of the Treasury
Internal Revenue Service
Fresno, CA 93888-0002

To Whom It May Concern:

Enclosed is my completed Form 1040 tax return for the year 2021 including the necessary schedules. I have underpaid for the year. This letter, along with the enclosed War Resisters League “pie chart,” explains why, as a matter of conscience, I am resisting paying war taxes and hence not including any payment for my unpaid tax liability.

I am not going to willingly or voluntarily pay for the war and militarism of the United States of America. Putin’s crimes in Ukraine don’t negate the dishonest and hypocritical ways that the United States uses taxes to foment war, prop up murderous regimes and defend destructive, dehumanizing extractive industries. Military hardware and personnel dominate expenditures when compared to other stated priorities, and that has only worsened since the beginning of the Ukraine War. The federal budget was already a drag, stalling the engines of positive social change. Now, more arms only will propel us faster to the precipice of armageddon.

Putin’s heinous destruction of Ukraine is unconscionable, but the crimes against humanity and war crimes committed by the United States in Afghanistan, Iraq and other elsewhere should disqualify it from acting as the human rights champion of the world. United States actions increase harm and the likelihood that my worst fears will be realized: the devastation and aftermath of nuclear annihilation. Even if Putin uses nuclear weapons or causes a radioactive accident at a nuclear power plant, that still wouldn’t justify United States or allied use of nuclear weapons. United States use of nuclear weapons won’t make things better!

I am not fundamentally against taxation or paying for some things I disagree with as a member of society. At times I have paid part of my tax liability. For many more years I reduced by necessary income below levels that even required me to file a tax return. I registered with selective service as a conscientious objector, and I try to live by the adage of “living simply so that others may simply live.” If you want my money for this carceral state, you are going to have to take it from me.

Sincerely,
James G. Haber

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Consequently, we are once again sending every penny of our federal tax liability to non-profit groups that help the victims of our wars, provide food and shelter to the poor at home, or are actively developing nonviolent alternatives to armed conflict.

This is the time when our collective home, our earth, needs every human effort, every resource, dedicated to saving it and all species on it from the havoc of climate change.

Sincerely
Betsy Corner
Randy Kehler

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Please find my enclosed 1040 form for tax year 2021. I’m including this letter in order to explain why payment for my calculated 2021 tax of $1970.00 is not also enclosed. 

Since 2000, I have refused payment of my taxes because US law does not provide a means for me to ensure that my tax contribution will not enrich our nation’s military-industrial complex, prison-industrial complex, immoral immigration system, or our government’s treacherous compact with oil corporations, which continue to wage an unfettered—and ultimately suicidal—assault on the natural world. Because the tax system provides no legal way for me to avoid supporting these things, I find no conscientious choice but to withhold payment entirely as an act of civil disobedience.

Conscientious objection to the payment of taxes and the redistribution of such funds to humane alternatives represents a longstanding nonviolence tradition. Tax resisters choose different methods. For example, some—like myself—file tax forms while withholding payment, some don’t file at all, and some live below the taxable income level. Some are content with resisting quietly as a personal practice, while others resist in a public way to raise awareness about our government’s misuse of tax income and to outwardly demonstrate the moral power of civil disobedience. 

I am not opposed to taxation in principle. I know that tax dollars fund many things that are life-serving. In order to contribute to the general welfare of our society and the world, I have offered the full amount of my calculated taxes since 2000 to support humane efforts to build a more just society and world community. In recent years the majority of the taxes I’ve redirected have been offered as long overdue reparations to Black and Indigenous-led groups working for their own liberation. If and when our nation transforms its spending priorities to genuinely reflect a commitment to healing, justice, and ecological responsibility, I will be happy to pay taxes to the IRS.

I send this letter with all due respect for the individuals who work at the IRS. My objections to the role your agency plays do not obstruct my care for you as human beings. In fact, my tax resistance is as much on your behalf as it is on my own.

Sincerely,
Chris Moore-Backman

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Fred Burks Photo Courtesy of Fred Burks

Dear friends at the IRS,

I am withholding 20% of my taxes this year as I cannot morally or legally support the U.S. military’s indiscriminate killing of many thousands of innocent civilians, including several U.S. citizens, in recent years. The intentional killing of U.S. civilians (three in Yemen in Sept. 2011) “without due process of law” is a clear violation of the U.S. Constitution’s Fifth Amendment. If another country’s military were to kill innocent U.S. civilians, there would be a huge uproar. Yet our military kills civilians of other countries with impunity, listing them as “collateral damage.” Besides being immoral, this is clearly turning family and friends of those killed against the United States and creating more terrorists.

A further, important reason I am withholding this portion of my taxes is that the amount of corruption in the U.S. military is inexcusable. A CNBC/Reuters article dated Aug. 19, 2016 stated, “The United States Army’s finances are so jumbled it had to make trillions of dollars of improper accounting adjustments to create an illusion that its books are balanced.” The small nonprofit I manage is held accountable for every dollar spent, while the U.S. military has not been held to account for trillions of U.S. taxpayers dollars.

The fact that the Pentagon has been ordered by U.S. courts to get its finances under control for over a decade, yet it has continually failed to do so, suggests a massive level of corruption that I don’t think any American should support. By not undertaking any comprehensive audit in recent decades until 2018 (when it miserably failed its first-ever comprehensive audit and has failed again in 2019 and 2020), our military has clearly violated the U.S. Constitution Article I Section 9 Clause 7.

Additionally, the U.S. government and military repeatedly commit illegal acts by carrying out wars that have never been declared by Congress, violating Article I Section 8 Clause 11 of the U.S. Constitution.

If our military stops killing civilians as collateral damage and brings the rampant corruption in its ranks under control, I will repay these taxes. I have put the amount I’ve withheld in a separate account which I will turn over to the IRS should the killing and corruption stop. If after 10 years nothing has changed, I will turn these funds over to organizations dedicated to stopping both corruption and the killing of civilians by our military. As my federal income tax this year was $4,469, I am withholding $894.

I chose the number 20% as, according to official government statistics, 15% ($600 billion) of the U.S. budget is spent directly on the military, while hundreds of billions more of our tax dollars are funneled into discretionary funds used to support the Pentagon‘s unjust and illegal wars. As you likely know, the term “national security” is being used as a cover for all manner of corruption and political manipulation. It’s time for all caring citizens to join in the call for greater integrity in our military.
I support our tax system. I deeply appreciate how it finances our roads, schools, infrastructure, and much more. Yet integrity in finances, as in all matters, is of the highest importance to me. I would be out of integrity to continue to support the indiscriminate killing and massive corruption in the U.S. military.

I gladly welcome a response and welcome this message being shared with any who cares about the integrity of our country.

With best wishes for ever more humanity and integrity in government,

Frederick B. Burks
January 24, 2021

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I am a Conscientious Objector (CO) to war, based on religious and ethical beliefs, as recognized and certified 36 years ago by the U.S. Selective Service System. My beliefs as a CO have prevented me from participating in military service. However, I have devoted my whole professional career to many forms of alternative service, trying to meet the unmet health and mental health needs of active duty military personnel and veterans, as well as those of other underserved communities in the United States and other countries. For instance, since 2005 I have directed a national network of volunteers, including health and mental health professionals and other people such as veterans and active duty military personnel, the Civilian Medical Resources Network. In this effort, we have provided free services to hundreds of active duty military personnel who have not been able to meet their needs for services within the military. Many of these clients have experienced severe problems due to their military service, including PTSD, severe depression, military sexual trauma, and substance abuse; about one half of the clients have been suicidal at the time of intake.

Due to my values as a CO, which derive from religious and ethical beliefs, I continue to experience profound ethical conflicts about paying for war through my taxes. For many years during and after the Vietnam War, I resisted half of my income taxes, leading to encounters with IRS officials who entered into dialogue with me. I contributed the money that I didn’t pay for war taxes to humanitarian projects, including various efforts to help active duty GIs and veterans. I argued and continue to argue that I and others like me who are conscientiously opposed to war should not suffer from the Constitutional contradiction of being recognized officially as a CO yet being required to pay taxes for war. Later, when the proportion of the U.S. federal budget devoted to war decreased somewhat, I decided not to resist a portion of my income taxes officially but continued to spend a substantial part of my earnings on humanitarian projects including services to current and former military personnel.

Now, our wars in various parts of the world have increased, the impacts of our military actions have created enormous devastation, including terrible effects on population health, horrible epidemics of suicide and deaths from drug abuse, adverse changes in the environment such as pollution and a substantial worsening of global warming, a rapid increase in gun violence in the United States and other countries, and a diversion of critically needed economic resources away from services like health, education, and improved infrastructure and into terribly destructive militarism. “Endless war” has become our way of life, although warfare directly affects mainly the most marginalized and disadvantaged groups in our society who see no other way to get a job or an education except through enlisting for military service. Meanwhile, despite its enormous costs, both financial and humanitarian, endless war leads to little or no apparent benefits, except large profits for a tiny portion of the world’s population. These ethically and religiously based considerations have led me to decide once again to withhold my financial support for war.

Statement from Mi Ra Lee to the IRS for Tax Year 2017:

I grew up in Korea, where war has had terrible effects on living beings for centuries. My family suffered directly from the Korean War and the dictatorships that followed that War, leading to deaths and injuries among many family members and dear friends. Our society also continues to suffer from prior wars, when we were conquered by Japan, China, North Korea, and other warmaking countries. As one of many examples, the women whom the Japanese military personnel used as “comfort women” have experienced deep trauma and degradation, which still has not been adequately compensated. Similar abuses affecting women have been perpetrated by military personnel from the United States and other countries that participated in the Korean War and that have maintained the military occupation of Korea.

Until very recently, conscientious objection was not tolerated and the entire male population was required to serve in the military; for that reason, many COs have been required to spend long periods of their lives in prisons. If military conscription had applied to women, I am sure that I would have been a CO and probably also would have gone to prison.

Since I have been living in the United States, I have been shocked by the negative impacts of warfare on the U.S. population, as well as the many populations around the world who have been adversely affected by U.S. military policies and practices. On a daily basis, we must live in fear within the United States, as veterans and others influenced by its military culture engage in almost daily tragedies involving gun violence. The tragedies of warfare, paid for through our taxes, are ruining us and the rest of the world’s peoples. For all these reasons and others, I also can no longer ethically pay half of my income taxes for war.

Sincerely,
Howard Waitzkin & Mi Ra Lee

The post War Tax Resister Profile: Howard Waitzkin and Mi Ra Lee first appeared on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

The post War Tax Resister Profile: Howard Waitzkin and Mi Ra Lee appeared first on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

One meeting —in person! — was about whether or not to catch up on filing state taxes. This resister has been a federal and state nonfiler with a low income for a few years. Now, due to changes in her employment and the fact that the IRS filed for her one year and is trying to collect, she feels it is time to catch up with the feds. She only owes Social Security/Medicare taxes for reported self-employment income, which she might decide to pay. But the state has not been after her at all, and her test filing showed that she didn’t have a taxable income and may even be owed a refund. New York State tends to be pretty efficient about going after state tax debt and pretty nasty about the whole process, but in this case there didn’t seem to be a need to file until she starts her new job.

In the course of our conversation I was reminded that it is useful to be able to talk openly about income, share tax forms and discuss them line-by-line. She used an online state tax preparation software, and I’ve been a dedicated paper-filer, but by not using the online option for state filing I had missed one credit I could have taken advantage of. It is a credit that is not obvious on the paper forms. So next year I will use the online version to make sure I’m not missing anything and then transfer the numbers to paper to file. I don’t want to get into online payments for taxes, which just gives the government — state or federal — a direct line to your bank account.

Scary Collection Letters

I was happy to get a call from a first-time resister. She and I had talked about state taxes months ago. (My focus has always been on the massive federal military budget, so I remain neutral on state tax resistance except that I always warn potential resisters that the NY state is much quicker to collect than the feds.) But this conversation was about her first collection letter from the IRS for federal taxes she refused after filing on May 17 this year. That’s pretty quick work for the IRS these days, so we discussed her employment situation (contractor) and the various things that might happen, the most certain being more letters from the IRS.

Erica Leigh wrote a good blog about letters a few years ago. If others have more recent links, please share them in the comments.

Finally, another friend sent an “oh oh they’re coming” email with a copy of a notice she received that shouts “Levy of Social Security Benefits is Imminent.” This scary-looking mailing from the “Tax Assessment Procedures Domestic Judgment Registry” (with an intriguing logo that I can’t quite make out) threatens that “the Federal Taxing Authorities can legally initiate the collection process of levying your Social Security Benefits and or any other retirement accounts.”  This so-called “Federal Taxing Authorities” cannot legally take anything. Only the IRS can do that. In fact, this very notice borders on illegal. It is a scam, one of many that the IRS is continually fighting.

When you receive letters that threaten collection but don’t actually look like an IRS letter, do a simple search online. In this case, if you type in “tax assessment procedures” the search engine automatically adds the word “scam.” A lawyer has a similar sample letter on his site with a good write-up about the scam. Do a search on the phone number in the letter; that also indicates it’s probably a scam.

Then I typed in “letter from federal taxing authorities,” which brought up a link to an IRS webpage titled “Taxpayers should beware of property lien scam.” The text of my friend’s letter indicates that whoever is behind it found her name in her county’s public lien postings.

There’s often a moment of catching one’s breath when an envelope arrives from the IRS (or even from one of the fake “taxing authorities”), so it’s helpful to remember “the IRS operates on 90% bluff” according to former Sen. Henry Belmon decades ago. Of course, we do need to stay prepared for that 10%. Having a support network in place is part of that preparation.

— Post by Ruth Benn

The post Taxing Issues first appeared on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

The post Taxing Issues appeared first on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

We have sent our U.S. Individual Income Tax Return for 2019 electronically. Of the total tax that is due the IRS, we are withholding $200.00. We do this as a way of honoring our values, giving concrete expression to our opposition to war and the use of our tax dollars for financing war.

We are members of the Mennonite church, one of three historic peace churches in the United States, which teaches that war and preparation for war are contrary to the will of God, and that the path to long-term peace is through justice, non-violence and loving our enemies. Article 22 of the Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective states that “As disciples of Christ, we do not prepare for war, or participate in war or military service”. In 1988, Community Mennonite Church, the local Mennonite congregation to which we belong, took formal action to support its members who,as an act of faith and conscience, choose to withhold part of their federal income tax. As shown in the attached letter, this act was reaffirmed in 1997 by our congregation.

We continue to be concerned about the extraordinarily high percentage of our Federal tax dollar that is used to finance past, present and future military spending, accounting for an estimated 47 percent (https://www.warresisters.org/resources/pie-chart-flyers-where-your-income-tax-money-really-goes). We are also concerned that, according to U.S. State Department estimates, the U.S. supplies an extraordinarily high percentage of the global arms market – 79 percent between 2007 and 2017 (https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/04/global-military-expenditure-and-arms-trade-report.html). The idolatry represented by this picture, as well as the high opportunity cost, is inconsistent with the beliefs and practices of our faith and values. We believe that our federal budget is a moral document: how we spend our money shows what we value as a nation.

We appreciate the freedoms that we have as citizens of the United States and feel a responsibility to support the legitimate institutions of the society of which we are a part. However, this causes us a conflict when it comes to paying all of our Federal Income Tax when nearly one-half of it is for military purposes.

The Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund Bill (H.R. 4169) provides a means for conscientious objectors to war and military spending to pay our full share of taxes without being complicit in violence or in preparations for war. We would like to see this bill passed and are sending the $200 being withheld to the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund and to Mennonite Church USA Peace Tax Fund http://mennoniteusa.org/news/peace-tax-fund/.

Sincerely,

Richard A. Yoder    Carolyn E. Yoder

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This year Tax Day is July 15. Thought you would be interested in this letter my wife and I have written the IRS refusing to pay for wars and preparations for wars. We find it very difficult to pray and work for peace and then pay for wars. We would welcome your thoughts about how you respond our government’s demands that we continue to pay for their wars and all the senseless and immoral bombing, droning and preparations for even a nuclear war which could put an end to all life on our beautiful planet. For more information about war tax resistance, go to NWTRCC.org (National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee).

Dear Friends at the IRS,

We cannot in conscience pay for the killing of other human beings or pay for war and preparations for war. Human life is too precious to drop bombs on people because we do not like their governments. Developing a new generation of nuclear weapons which could put an end to life on our beautiful planet is immoral and insane..

Giving the Pentagon hundreds of billions of dollars does not increase the security of our people when we are cutting funds for schools, libraries, job training, and now even the EPA, diplomacy work at the State Department., and transition to a renewable energy future.

The wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen and elsewhere, and increased use of drones, have NOT increased our security, but have created more enemies of the United States. Let’s end the war on terror and bring the tax dollars home to meet the needs of the American people.

We are Quakers and cannot in conscience contribute in any way to the killing of our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world. Fifty-four percent of our tax dollars go for wars and preparations for wars. Together with our IRS Form, we are sending a check for 46% of what we owe made out to the Dept. of Health and Human Services. We ask that you designate all those funds for health and education and human well-being – and NONE for war and killing.

The other 54% which goes for war and killing we are contributing to organizations working for peace and justice. and programs meeting human and environmental needs in the US and around the world.

Instead of paying for war and killing, we are joining together with others to build what Martin Luther King called the “Beloved Community.” We hope and pray that all the taxes from people worldwide can go for schools, good health care, food and housing for all people on earth, as we help create a healthy planet for our children and all future generations.

Sincerely,
David and Jan Hartsough

The post David Hartsough 2020 first appeared on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

The post David Hartsough 2020 appeared first on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

IRS

Fresno, CA 93888-0002

To whom it may concern:

I am withholding half of my taxes because I am a Christian. Killing is against my conscience as stated in the 10 Commandments.

Taxes for the military kill directly and indirectly. Directly, when there are wars, drones, or perhaps some military actions. Indirectly, by taking over half the money in the yearly budget which could otherwise go to support so many lives.

Thank you for listening,

Carol Caffrey

The post Carol Caffrey first appeared on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

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Statement of Resistance from Howard Waitzkin to the IRS for Tax Year 2017:

Howard Waitzkin & Mi Ra Lee. Photo provided by Howard Waitzkin.

I am a Conscientious Objector (CO) to war, based on religious and ethical beliefs, as recognized and certified 36 years ago by the U.S. Selective Service System. My beliefs as a CO have prevented me from participating in military service. However, I have devoted my whole professional career to many forms of alternative service, trying to meet the unmet health and mental health needs of active duty military personnel and veterans, as well as those of other underserved communities in the United States and other countries. For instance, since 2005 I have directed a national network of volunteers, including health and mental health professionals and other people such as veterans and active duty military personnel, the Civilian Medical Resources Network. In this effort, we have provided free services to hundreds of active duty military personnel who have not been able to meet their needs for services within the military. Many of these clients have experienced severe problems due to their military service, including PTSD, severe depression, military sexual trauma, and substance abuse; about one half of the clients have been suicidal at the time of intake.

Due to my values as a CO, which derive from religious and ethical beliefs, I continue to experience profound ethical conflicts about paying for war through my taxes. For many years during and after the Vietnam War, I resisted half of my income taxes, leading to encounters with IRS officials who entered into dialogue with me. I contributed the money that I didn’t pay for war taxes to humanitarian projects, including various efforts to help active duty GIs and veterans. I argued and continue to argue that I and others like me who are conscientiously opposed to war should not suffer from the Constitutional contradiction of being recognized officially as a CO yet being required to pay taxes for war. Later, when the proportion of the U.S. federal budget devoted to war decreased somewhat, I decided not to resist a portion of my income taxes officially but continued to spend a substantial part of my earnings on humanitarian projects including services to current and former military personnel.

Now, our wars in various parts of the world have increased, the impacts of our military actions have created enormous devastation, including terrible effects on population health, horrible epidemics of suicide and deaths from drug abuse, adverse changes in the environment such as pollution and a substantial worsening of global warming, a rapid increase in gun violence in the United States and other countries, and a diversion of critically needed economic resources away from services like health, education, and improved infrastructure and into terribly destructive militarism. “Endless war” has become our way of life, although warfare directly affects mainly the most marginalized and disadvantaged groups in our society who see no other way to get a job or an education except through enlisting for military service. Meanwhile, despite its enormous costs, both financial and humanitarian, endless war leads to little or no apparent benefits, except large profits for a tiny portion of the world’s population. These ethically and religiously based considerations have led me to decide once again to withhold my financial support for war.

Statement of Resistance from Mi Ra Lee to the IRS for Tax Year 2017:

Howard Waitzkin & Mi Ra Lee. Photo provided by Howard Waitzkin.

I grew up in Korea, where war has had terrible effects on living beings for centuries. My family suffered directly from the Korean War and the dictatorships that followed that War, leading to deaths and injuries among many family members and dear friends. Our society also continues to suffer from prior wars, when we were conquered by Japan, China, North Korea, and other war-making countries. As one of many examples, the women whom the Japanese military personnel used as “comfort women” have experienced deep trauma and degradation, which still has not been adequately compensated. Similar abuses affecting women have been perpetrated by military personnel from the United States and other countries that participated in the Korean War and that have maintained the military occupation of Korea. Until very recently, conscientious objection was not tolerated and the entire male population required to serve in the military; for that reason, many COs have been required to spend long periods of their lives in prisons. If military conscription had applied to women, I am sure that I would have been a CO and probably also would have gone to prison.

Since I have been living in the United States, I have been shocked by the negative impacts of warfare on the U.S. population, as well as the many populations around the world who have been adversely affected by U.S. military policies and practices. On a daily basis, we must live in fear within the United States, as veterans and others influenced by its military culture engage in almost daily tragedies involving gun violence. The tragedies of warfare, paid for through our taxes, are ruining us and the rest of the world’s peoples. For all these reasons and others, I also can no longer ethically pay half of my income taxes for war.

Sincerely,

Howard Waitzkin & Mi Ra Lee

The post War Tax Resister Profile: Howard Waitzkin and Mi Ra Lee first appeared on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

The post War Tax Resister Profile: Howard Waitzkin and Mi Ra Lee appeared first on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

Enclosed please find my federal tax return for the year 2018, which I have filled out honestly and accurately to the best of my knowledge.

However, I have not enclosed payment for the amount indicated on line 22. I have redirected this amount to organizations that promote peace, justice, reconciliation, and healing. Allow me to tell you why.

The Trump Administration has undeniably made the world a more dangerous place. Not only does the Administration plan to increase our already-bloated military budget to an astonishing $750 billion, but they propose to add $7.87 billion to “replace and modernize” America’s nuclear arsenal. This, plus the planned withdrawal from the INF Treaty, can only rekindle a new nuclear arms race, which is the height of madness. I cannot in good conscience pay for such insanity. According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies, the United States spends more on its military than the next 10 countries (ranked by military spending) combined.

Additionally, the bellicose rhetoric emerging from the Trump Administration had led to escalating tensions and violence. Trump’s high-stakes game with North Korea has not led to peace. His tough talk and withdrawal from the landmark Iran Nuclear Deal has inflamed things there as well. And, like a bull in a china shop, he has done all he can to sabotage the already fragile peace process in Israel and Palestine. His policies have emboldened dictators throughout the world. U.S. arms sales to Saudi Arabia have enabled that country to prosecute a war in Yemen that has reached genocidal proportions. I simply cannot support such murderous policies, large affecting innocent civilians and children.

The Trump Administration’s draconian immigration policies do not represent the America I know and believe in. Perhaps we should mark the Statue of Liberty with “Return to Sender” and ship it back to France, because such policies fly in the face of everything that statue stands for. Instead of Lady Liberty’s “world-wide welcome,” we institute Muslim travel bans and separate families at the U.S.-Mexico border, where Mr. Trump wants to build his wall. Why, one might ask, are so many seeking asylum here? Could it be the result of many decades of U.S. policies that have installed brutal dictators in Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, friendly to U.S. corporations but deadly to their own populations? Families are running away from death squads, gang violence, and extortionists that literally get away with murder.

This hits home for me. I know what it means to run for one’s life and become a refugee from violence. During World War II, my mother’s family narrowly escaped Nazi persecution and certain death (my father’s family was less fortunate) and entered Switzerland illegally, where — thank goodness — they were given refuge and temporary asylum. If Mr. Trump had been in charge of the Swiss border, I would not be alive today. I cannot support these heartless policies that go against everything I believe in. Scarily, Trump’s words and policies have been championed by white supremacists and racists across the country (and in other countries as well), leading to a horrifying escalation in hate crimes. What has happened to this country?

As if this were not enough, the Trump Administration’s persistent denial of climate change, their withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord, their gutting of the EPA, and their promotion of increased fossil fuel extraction threaten the entire world. Climate chaos and destabilization, not immigration, is the greatest existential threat facing us today, and, once again, Mr. Trump’s policies have gone precisely in the wrong direction. We are losing time when time is of the essence. How can I support a government whose policies are suicidal, leading to the end of life as we know it on this planet? The answer, simply, is that I cannot. I cannot.

I fully realize that, in redirecting my taxes away from the federal government and toward organizations whose work I do believe in, I am engaging in an act of civil disobedience. So be it. I do so in the spirit of Mohandas K. Gandhi, Henry David Thoreau, Martin Luther King, Jr., Rosa Parks, and many, many others. If I can’t support the policies of this government with my mind and my heart, then I can’t support them with my wallet either. I submit to whatever penalty this action may incur.

Sincerely,
Aaron Falbel

The post Aaron Falbel 2019 first appeared on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

The post Aaron Falbel 2019 appeared first on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

To my government representatives,

My 2018 tax return says that I owe $215 in taxes. I am once again writing to explain why I will not pay the amount I owe to the federal government. Currently the majority of every tax dollar goes to pay for past,
present, and future wars. I can not pay for war. As much as I value our country’s laws, I believe that God’s laws must come first, and God tells us, “Thou shalt not kill.”

In addition to paying for foreign wars, the 1033 Program transfers excess military equipment to civilian law enforcement agencies. The program legally requires the Department of Defense to make various items of
equipment available to local law enforcement, thereby militarizing our police forces and treating civilians in our communities the same as armed combatants in a war zone. The Office of the Inspector General, the USA
Department of Defense, the USA Government Accountability Office, the NAACP, and the ACLU are among the many critics of this program. Barack Obama signed an Executive Order prohibiting certain types of equipment and requiring police agencies to justify their need for other military equipment, but Donald Trump rolled back that order so that police departments now have access to military surplus equipment typically used in warfare, including grenade launchers, large-caliber weapons and ammunition, armored vehicles and bayonets. The 1033 program was originally created to assist local law enforcement in drug investigations, yet equipment is now used to counter nonviolent demonstrations and policing in non-white communities. Instead of police protecting their communities, they are now being trained as occupying forces in our cities and towns. In 2014 a sleeping baby was maimed and nearly killed by a grenade used during a police raid of a drug suspect. At least 81 civilians and 13 police officers died in “dynamic entry” house raids from 2010 to 2016.

The number of civilians killed by police keeps increasing. In 2018 police killed 1,166 people, up from 1,147 in 2017. Black people were 25% of those killed despite being only 13% of the population. Black people are three times more likely to be killed than white people, and a higher percentage of unarmed black people are killed compared to unarmed white victims. There were only 23 days in 2018 when police did not kill someone in the USA. Only one-fourth of our way through 2019 there have already been 265 people shot and killed by police this year (as of 03/20/2019). The toll on African-American communities is especially serious. Several studies have found that black males are shot by police at disproportionately high rates. Black men aged 15-34 are between 9 and 16 times more likely to be killed by police than other people. In 2017, police killed 19 unarmed black males. Police usually use fatal force against people armed with knives or guns, but unarmed victims of police shootings are also more likely to be minorities, according to FBI statistics. 13 of the largest USA city police departments kill black men at higher rates than the USA illegal murder rate.

My government is asking me to not only support war in other countries, but to also pay to kill people in my own country, particularly people whose skin is darker than mine. In the USA it is illegal to pay for someone else to murder, yet our government is asking me to do just that. Whether in other lands or in the USA, our government saying that war and killing is right does not make it so.

It pains me not to pay all of the federal taxes I owe each year. I want to fulfill my financial responsibilities to the country I live in without denying my conscience and faith. Unfortunately we seem bent on destroying some communities rather than meeting human needs. Given a choice of paying to kill or dealing with financial penalties and the threat of prison, I have to choose your penalties. I won’t pay for war.

This year I will donate at least $215.00 to non-profit groups working to heal the wounds of war and prevent future wars in various parts of the world. I am not benefiting financially from my refusal to pay for war. Every cent I owe is being paid to save lives, not to destroy lives.

I urge you to make it possible for U.S.A. citizens to follow our faith and conscience without breaking the law. I also urge you to think deeply about how we can change our country’s direction in order to live out God’s command to love our neighbors.

In peace, Susan Lee Barton

The post Susan Lee Barton 2019 first appeared on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.

The post Susan Lee Barton 2019 appeared first on National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.