If donations from conservative American Catholics to the Vatican begin to decline, a papal visit to the US with many smiling photo ops at the White House will occur in early 2018.
Sadly I believe that you are correct.
All of this is being driven by what they feel is most likely to start refilling the collection baskets.
Do Catholics have an option to ‘tithe’/donate to where ever they choose?
For Mormons, ‘tithing’ is to be done to the LDS church proper - I used to make my checks out to SLC “the corporation of the president of the CoJCoLDS”,n with any money given to charites being over what was owed to the Mormon church. However Evangelicals often choose where to donate - my husband and I were between churches and ‘tithed’/donated to various ministries and still divide our donations between the local church and other ministries.