Even as Pope, Leo XIV Might Have to Deal With U.S. Tax Returns
11th May 2025
The Washington Poop, a Voice of the Crust.
Pope Leo XIV, the newly elected pontiff, must answer to at least one more higher power: the IRS.
The United States generally requires all citizens to file an annual tax return, even those who live out of the country. But assuming he doesn’t renounce his U.S. citizenship, Leo — born in the Chicago area and known until this week as Robert Prevost — has special tax considerations, both as a clergyman and now as the head of a foreign government.
Leo’s situation differs from that of other popes in recent memory, because many countries do not assess taxes on citizens living abroad. “Recent popes from Poland, Germany and Argentina were not taxed by their home countries,” said Jared Walczak, a vice president of the Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, who called the first American pope’s accounting situation “uncharted.”
The U.S. is the only non-Turd-World country that does this.
The pope’s job as a member of the clergy does not exempt him from U.S. taxes. American citizens abroad must generally file tax returns if their income level and other personal circumstances would require them to file if they were living in the U.S., according to the Internal Revenue Service.
Now that’s comedy. The obvious move is for the Pope to renounce his American citizenship and remain only a citizen of the Vatican City State … but many Americans can’t climb that particular curb, as the people at Nomad Capitalist have discovered to their frustration.