Tax Strike NV Wants You To Join Him in Some Tax Resistance This Year

A local anarchist figure calling himself Tax Strike NV on social media has made a splash recently, with already over 1,000 followers on Bluesky, with in person presence at multiple local protests as well, handing out flyers on how to take part in tax protests and why.

“Assist and promote Protests, Strikes, Conscientious Objection & Civil Disobedience using Tax Resistance in N and the E Sierra,” the tagline reads on the account’s Bluesky channel, on a platform that has grown as a leftist alternative to X.

“How are you resisting? If you're uncomfortable answering publicly...DM or email us,” a recent post indicates. 

The Tax Strike NV website as well as its social media channels, including an Instagram and a YouTube, will soon point to upcoming national zooms such as a “W-4 Resistance Workshop on Zoom, February 5th at 10 a.m. (our time)” and a “War Tax Resistance 101 (on Zoom), Tuesday February 24th at 5 p.m.”   A watch party for another National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee presentation was previously held at the library.

“I’m just saying here's something that you could do if you're unhappy with where your taxes are going, here's some sources on how you could react to your unhappiness essentially,” the person behind this endeavor, who wanted to remain anonymous, told Our Town Reno over the phone earlier today. 

Part of this resist taxation tradition he says dates back to the Vietnam War when conscientious objectors didn’t want to go to war, but also didn’t want to pay for other people going to war.

“I had to drill through their website to figure out how I could legally and easily do tax resistance,” he said of the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee.  “Because it seems very complicated but if you drill down far enough, it's very easy.”

One technique is called “slow taxation,” essentially paying back owed federal payments as slowly as possible.

“Wait until April 15th to send your tax money in if you owe anything. And when you do, delay it even further by mailing it in. Send a check. What you're trying to do is you're trying to delay how long they've got your money,” he explained.  

Another he called “scofflawery” is when you slightly reduce the amount you owe.  

“You could withhold $10.40 from your check,” he gave as an example.    

Other tax resisters live below the taxable income to avoid paying any income tax while others increase exemptions on their W-4 forms so that little or no federal income tax ends up being withheld.  

Some apply for a filing extension, to hold their payments until October, while others choose the longest possible payment plans with the smallest possible payments initially.  

More outspoken tax protesters include a protest letter and redirect an amount they are withholding to a mutual aid organization, even if they may have to pay a penalty later in the process.  

“Make them chase you,” he said. “It is fun to make them chase you for your taxes,” he explained saying the scofflawery technique can lead to lengthy, administrative back and forths.    

He then added to clarify:  “I’m not telling anyone to do anything wrong.”

He says with tax season now upon us and what’s happening in Minnesota, “people are like ‘wait a minute.  They took this much out already out of my paycheck this whole year I wonder if some of that was used to pay ICE salaries?  That makes me mad. What can I do about that?’” 

For future planning, adjusting your W-4 can prevent you from giving the government what he says is “a year long tax-free loan to buy guns to kill people with. You can very easily stop that by adjusting your W-4.”

“They've got videos, they've got explainers, they've got flow charts,” he says of the upcoming zooms with the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee for which he will be organizing local watch parties.

He’s also in negotiations to do some local Tax Day protesting, “a celebration of all the people who have tried tax resistance in this tax season,” he says, perhaps with the Generator or the Reno Punk Rock Flea Market. If interested, he welcomes anyone to reach out.  

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