IRS form 1722 for naturalization

If you’re looking to become a US citizen and you don’t know why the Department of Homeland Security has asked for an IRS form 1722 for naturalization, then look no further. And don’t look for the elusive and quite frankly non-existent 1722.

What the US government want to ascertain is that you’ll make a good citizen. One of the obligations of the good citizen is to pay their taxes every year. It’s part of the citizenship examination – after all the happy federal government is a funded one.

So they ask you for a form that doesn’t exist to prove that you’ve been paying what you owe. Even though, as all regulated financial advisers are required to tell you, past performance is no indication of future performance. Still, you can’t not pay your taxes and expect to be welcomed with open arms into the bosom of citizenship. And they do hope that you’ll continue to pay taxes when you naturalize.

This is a big one. If you’re been a resident alien and earned money in the United States of America, then you will have to pay the appropriate taxes on it and also file the appropriate tax documentation on time. Then of course, you have to prove it, you can’t just go to the interview and say that you’ve done it.

So how do you prove that you’ve been a model alien and paid your dues? Well the easiest way is to get your tax transcripts. These itemize the payments, deductions and tax liabilities each year and you can easily go onto the IRS website and ask for them.

They come in two flavors – the long version and the summary version. My preference is to provide the full version when asked for the IRS form 1722 for naturalization. More paper is perhaps bad for the environment, but it is good for building a fat file of data which shows that you can toe the line.