Oh USA law is so fucked up complex , layered and contradictory it is amazing.
So asking theymos to do mixers would likely mean asking him to relocate to a far more liberal tax country. Just to run the forum. That may not be realistic at all for him.
You've got the first part right, 100%. I just saw a woman who was quite obviously in her 50s-60s get denied cigarettes at a gas station because she couldn't produce an ID. That's an example of law coming into direct conflict with common sense, and it's idiotic.
And moving the forum to an offshore country in order to preserve mixer campaigns? Yeah, there's no reason for that even if it were easy enough to do, which it isn't.