Personal Exemption on NRA Spouse

[mxalex]

Spouse is NRA, will not be filing a US tax return and we don't want to get him a ITIN. I will be filing MFS. I came to a section where it asks if we lived together in 2017. We did not; I lived in the US and he in Canada. (But he did visit me for a week in September) Next it asks if he had income, not US income. Will he be filing a return, not a US return. And can he be claimed as a dep for someone else, technically no. Does this mean I can claim him as a personal exemption? Does this consider him my dependent?

[KarenJ · Accepted solution]

Unfortunately, you cannot claim him as a dependent.  However, you can still file as married filing separately.  

If you are a US citizen and your spouse does not have a Social Security number or an ITIN and you are not applying for an ITIN with the tax return then you can only file your tax return as Married Filing Separately.  Where asked to enter the spouse's Social Security number enter a 'dummy" SSN 999-88-9999.  You can only print and mail your tax return, it cannot be e-filed.  When you print the tax return "white-out"  the Social Security number for your spouse and manually enter NRA for a non-resident alien.

See this TurboTax support FAQ for the procedure to print and mail a tax return using the online editions - https://ttlc.intuit.com/questions/1944348-how-do-i-print-and-mail-my-return-in-turbotax-online

 [Edited 03.18.20 | 3:33 pm]