Latest news with #REALIDActof2005
Epoch Times
20-05-2025
- Epoch Times
TSA Says Nearly 7 Percent of Air Travelers Don't Have ‘REAL ID'
Nearly 7 percent of travelers flying through U.S. airports still do not have a REAL ID-compliant form of identification, Transportation Security Administration (TSA) Acting Administrator Ha Nguyen McNeill wrote in The new enforcement began on May 7, marking the end of repeated delays to implement a key post-9/11 security measure. Under the REAL ID Act of 2005, standard driver's licenses must meet stricter federal security standards to be accepted at airport checkpoints. More than 93 percent of passengers now present either a REAL ID or an acceptable alternative, such as a passport, McNeill said. McNeill noted that, as the 9/11 Commission Report stated, travel documents are 'as important as weapons' for terrorists. 'This Administration will no longer delay the decades-long deferment of these requirements,' she added, noting collaboration with Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. TSA was formed under DHS in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States. McNeill said the enforcement comes as TSA braces for record-breaking passenger volumes during the 2026 World Cup across 11 U.S. cities and the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. The agency is committed to improving both security and the traveler experience, she said, calling this period a 'strategic crossroads' for the agency and for the broader U.S. transportation network. Related Stories 5/7/2025 5/6/2025 McNeill highlighted the rollout of upgraded screening technologies. As of April, TSA had deployed more than 2,100 Credential Authentication Technology (CAT) machines and nearly 1,000 Computed Tomography (CT) scanners. CAT machines verify IDs and boarding information, and many now support mobile driver's licenses and optional facial recognition. CT scanners allow passengers to keep laptops and liquids in bags by generating 3D images of carry-on contents. Still, a full rollout to all 432 commercial airports is years away, the agency said. TSA expects to finish installing CAT machines nationwide by 2049 and CT scanners by 2043, barring further delays. The agency screened 904 million passengers, 494 million checked bags, and 2.1 billion carry-on bags in 2024, said McNeill, who described these as 'record highs' for U.S. airports. She added that 3 million passengers are screened on peak days. The written testimony further emphasized a shift in priorities under Secretary Noem, saying DHS is moving toward 'innovation, organizational accountability, and a renewed focus on passenger experience and security' and away from the Biden administration's focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). 'With continued support from Congress and this Committee, a screening process that is efficient, technologically integrated, secure, and more affordable to the American taxpayer is within our grasp,' she said.
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Yahoo
How to know if you have a REAL ID in Wisconsin:
(WFRV) – Planning to fly within the United States? Make sure your identification is REAL ID compliant, as federal requirements are now in effect. In Wisconsin, you can tell if your driver's license or state ID is compliant by checking for a star in the upper right-hand corner. Marinette County crash leads to the death of an 18-year-old woman If your card has the star, it meets the federal standards set by the REAL ID Act of 2005. REAL IDs are required for domestic air travel and for accessing certain federal facilities, such as military bases or federal buildings. 'Impacts and implications on community': Oshkosh PD investigating numerous graffiti incidents on City's southside If your ID does not have a star, you can still use it—just not for flying or entering those secured federal facilities. Residents who do not plan to fly do not need to upgrade. To check your REAL ID status or learn how to get one, visit Wisconsin DMV's REAL ID page. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Epoch Times
07-05-2025
- Politics
- Epoch Times
The REAL ID Deadline Is Here: What You Need to Know
WASHINGTON—As of May 7, the REAL ID Act of 2005 will come into full effect. Everyone in the United States will require new forms of government-issued photo identification to board a domestic flight or enter a federal facility, and many Americans will need to change their IDs to comply. Below, we list five key details about the REAL ID program. 1. May 7 Deadline Remains, but Non-REAL ID Holders May Still Fly Ordinarily, under the REAL ID Act, anyone seeking to board a domestic flight must present a REAL ID or a compliant document at airports. The deadline when that would come into effect is May 7, 2025. Obtaining a REAL ID requires additional documents—such as proof of lawful status in the United States—beyond those regularly provided when obtaining a driver's license. On May 6, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced that an exemption would be granted to enable non-REAL ID holders to fly even after May 7. She said that travelers without REAL ID will be diverted to a different queue at Transportation Security Administration (TSA) screening checkpoints, and would undergo additional screening steps, but they would be permitted to board flights. 'What will happen, tomorrow, is folks will come through the line ... if [their ID is] not compliant, they may be diverted to a different line [and] have an extra step, but people will be allowed to fly,' Noem told the U.S. House of Representatives' Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security during an oversight hearing. Noem's statement is a new development in terms of REAL ID planning. As of writing, neither the TSA nor the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) had Related Stories 4/15/2025 5/6/2025 The rules for international travel have not changed, and travelers will still need a passport booklet to fly internationally to and from the United States. 2. Knowing Whether You Have a REAL ID, or Not Usually, a REAL ID takes the form of a driver's license or a non-driver photo ID card issued by a state's Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) or equivalent. States may issue such documents even if they are not REAL IDs. If your document is also a REAL ID, this is indicated by the presence of a black or gold star in the top corner of the plastic card. At present, every state, the District of Columbia, and federal territory issues driver's licenses and non-driver ID cards that are REAL IDs. Some also issue non-REAL ID cards to citizens and residents. These non-REAL ID cards are often cheaper to obtain and do not require as many supporting documents, making them attractive to individuals who merely want a license or ID for everyday purposes. They are also regularly issued to illegal immigrants by some states. Usually, these non-REAL ID documents will have a notation that reads 'Not Valid for Federal Purposes' or an equivalent and will not bear the required black or gold star. These documents are not REAL ID compliant and will be invalid for flying after May 7, save for the temporary exemption announced by Noem. Temporary driver's licenses, usually printed on paper, even with the requisite star, are not recognized by the TSA as being valid for REAL ID purposes. The document must be plastic or permanent. It is unclear whether mobile driver's licenses, downloaded to the Apple Wallet and Google Wallet programs, will be accepted for REAL ID purposes. 3. Compliant Documents, Such as a Passport, Can Be Used in Place of REAL ID REAL ID, as we have However, the U.S. government will recognize, for REAL ID purposes, other documents that are not REAL IDs, but which are issued with similar standards of thorough verification of identity. Individuals can use these documents instead of REAL ID for domestic air travel, entering federal buildings, and any other purpose for which REAL ID may be required. The U.S. passport booklets and U.S. passport cards; Lawful Permanent Resident cards—'green cards'—held by foreign nationals who are admitted as permanent residents of the United States; Enhanced driver's licenses and Enhanced IDs issued by certain states, such as Washington, Minnesota, Michigan, New York, and Vermont, which denote U.S. citizenship and may be used to cross land borders; Trusted Traveler Program cards issued by the DHS, such as Global Entry, NEXUS, SENTRI, and FAST cards; Tribal Nation photo ID cards, for Native Americans who are members of a federally recognized Native/Indian Tribe; Foreign passport booklets issued by a foreign government—preferably, the same document used to enter the United States; I-766 Employment Authorization Document cards, for foreign nationals who are authorized by DHS to work in the United States—such as F-1 status students undergoing 'Optional Practical Training' or 'Curricular Practical Training'; Canadian driver's licenses, issued by Canadian provinces to citizens and residents of Canada who are visiting the United States. Anyone with these documents may use them instead of REAL ID for the same purposes. 4. Illegal Immigrants Cannot Obtain REAL ID To obtain a REAL ID, the applicant needs to provide proof of lawful status in the United States. U.S. citizens are ordinarily required to provide proof of citizenship, such as a passport, birth certificate issued by a U.S. jurisdiction, naturalization certificate, consular report of birth abroad (CBRA), or an N-600 Certificate of Citizenship. Foreign nationals, by contrast, must present both their foreign passport and proof of lawful status in the United States, which are inspected by state authorities when applying for a REAL ID. The actual duration of a REAL ID's validity will be limited by the duration of authorized stay for the foreign national in question. A foreign national who entered the United States without inspection, or who overstayed the duration of their status, such as an illegal immigrant, however, will likely not possess documents that indicate lawful presence in the United States. These foreign nationals will not be able to obtain a REAL ID, though they may still use their foreign passport or any other document that is REAL ID-compliant in order to fly. The DHS has indicated that such illegal immigrants should only be flying in the United States if they are seeking to leave the country. ' Illegal aliens should not be allowed to fly in the U.S. UNLESS SELF DEPORTING,' wrote DHS in a It remains an open question as to whether illegal immigrants who have applied for asylum, or received any other immigration relief from removal, may apply for REAL ID. 5. States Are Facing Severe Backlogs for REAL ID Appointments Amid the approaching deadline, Americans have flocked to state DMV offices to obtain REAL IDs. The high demand, heightened review, and additional documentation requirements mean that many states have been overwhelmed, resulting in a shortage of appointments to obtain REAL IDs. This has prevented many from obtaining them before the deadline. The problem has been 'Anticipating the recent increase in demand, which is being seen all over the country, we have made many additional accommodations to service as many customers with REAL ID as possible, including with this new emergency program,' acting New Jersey MVC Chief Administrator Latrecia Littles-Floyd said in a Wait times and booking processes for REAL ID appointments will vary from state to state. While individuals wait for an appointment, they may use a REAL ID-compliant document, or apply for one, which may permanently substitute for a REAL ID.
Yahoo
06-05-2025
- Yahoo
REAL ID deadline: Does your child need one to fly in New York?
The REAL ID enforcement deadline is this week. Starting on May 7, adults will need compliant identification – or an acceptable alternative like a passport – for commercial air travel within the U.S. and to enter certain other facilities. The new rule stems from the REAL ID Act of 2005, which 'established minimum security standards for state-issued driver's licenses and identification cards and prohibits certain federal agencies from accepting for official purposes licenses and identification cards from states that do not meet these standards,' according to the Department of Homeland Security. While travelers over 18 may need to update their documents, the change does not apply to children. Here's what to know. How to get a REAL ID: TSA approves these alternatives to REAL ID if you haven't gotten one yet Do kids need a REAL ID to fly? No. The Transportation Security Administration does not require children to show ID when flying domestically, the agency said on its website. However, adults accompanying minors must do so. Airline rules may vary, however, and some require parents or guardians to bring unaccompanied minors to the departure gate, according to the Department of Transportation. Adults need to have a photo ID for that. Travelers should check their carrier's requirements before flying. Nathan Diller is a consumer travel reporter for USA TODAY based in Nashville. You can reach him at ndiller@ This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Flying with children? What to know about REAL ID requirements
Yahoo
06-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Republicans Are Already Plotting to Steal the Midterms
Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Generate Key Takeaways For a president who's talked constantly about winning, Donald Trump has so far been rife with losses—in the stock market, on the diplomatic front, in the courts, and in public approval. His first 100 days were nothing short of a disaster, hampered not just by Trump's own ineptitude but by the ineptitude of his sycophantic subordinates and his presidential proxy, Elon Musk. Trump has fumbled peace talks between Israel and Hamas; alienated Ukraine while kowtowing to Putin; fired tens of thousands of workers (many of whom, following legal challenges, he has been forced to rehire); had his national security team publicly exposed as incompetent buffoons; thus far failed in his plans to capture Greenland or the Panama Canal; and stumbled into a global trade war that's likely to drag down the entire economy. It would not be remotely surprising if the economy is in the midst of recession when voters head to the polls in November for the midterm elections. Things are currently going so badly, in fact, that a recession is far from the worst-case scenario. Meanwhile, special elections in Florida and Wisconsin have suggested that voters are already fed up with the Trump administration and point to the possibility that the 2026 midterms could be a blue wave. As Trump's failures continue to mount, Republicans have good reason to fear a backlash. Perhaps this explains why Trump is intent on bolstering the election denial movement, which has lately notched a number of key victories. On March 25, the president signed Executive Order #14248, 'Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections,' which neither preserves nor protects our elections but rather undermines them. It is a clarion call to Republicans throughout the nation, who are being encouraged to question the legitimacy of any election loss and ultimately establish a permanent electoral advantage by challenging and removing eligible voters from the rolls. Now, with Trump's executive order, they have insurance: a way of tipping elections in their favor by choosing the voters rather than having the voters choose them. The order instructs the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, or EAC, to amend its national mail voter registration form to require that all voters present documentation proving they are citizens, in the form of an ID that conforms with the REAL ID Act of 2005, a military ID, government-issued photo ID (all of which must indicate citizenship status or be accompanied by proof of citizenship), or a passport. A study from the University of Maryland found that this measure alone could disenfranchise approximately one in 10 voters—over 21 million Americans—who do not possess such documents and may have difficulty obtaining them. The result is a poll tax of sorts that would add a cost to voting for those who would have to acquire new IDs, and disenfranchise those unable to acquire them or unaware of the new requirements—a burden that studies have found would fall disproportionately on voters of color, Democrats, and independents. It's not at all clear that the president has any power to issue such instructions in a country where elections are managed by the states and the bipartisan EAC. Richard Hasen, director of the Safeguarding Democracy Project at UCLA School of Law, believes many parts of the executive order are unconstitutional. The EAC 'is an independent agency,' he said. Trump 'may try to argue under the unitary executive theory that he has such power, but that will have to be resolved in the courts.' (Trump was dealt a blow on April 24, when a U.S. District Court judge halted the executive order's proof of citizenship requirement.) Hasen characterized Trump's executive order as a 'power grab,' issued 'perhaps in the hopes of influencing how future elections are run in order to try to help his preferred candidates and party win.' Constitutional law professor Doug Spencer of the University of Colorado Boulder said that, while the EAC order is a 'gray area,' he, too, fears that the likely result of any such effort would be to disenfranchise voters who have trouble proving their citizenship, putting an 'onus' on voters to secure what should be an inalienable right. It's 'going to lead to many people who have a fundamental right not being able to exercise it,' he said, 'and, in my opinion, that's a problem for a country that wants to call itself a democracy.' Spencer also cautioned that it was far from obvious that the executive order would actually work as intended. In recent years, the Republican Party's share of low-propensity voters—those who don't consistently vote, a group disproportionately affected by restrictions—has grown significantly. In other words, the issuance of an executive order intended to make it easier for Republicans to win elections could ironically disenfranchise a growing part of its base. But even if it does disenfranchise some Republican voters, the executive order goes further than simply making voting more onerous, providing several ways for Republicans to both win elections and challenge elections they have lost. It directs the U.S. attorney general to sue states that count mailed ballots that are postmarked before Election Day but arrive afterward, effectively killing vote-by-mail. It also mandates that state election officials share voter databases with the secretary of homeland security, and the administrator of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, the cost-cutting commission run by billionaire Elon Musk, all of whom could challenge lists, potentially purging voters. The penalty for noncompliance is extreme. The executive order instructs the attorney general to prioritize investigations into any state that refuses to comply with the information-sharing dictum, and to 'review for potential withholding of grants and other funds that the Department awards and distributes, in the Department's discretion, to State and local governments for law enforcement and other purposes.' In other words, if state election officials refuse to comply with Trump's unlawful edict to share their voter rolls with Elon Musk, among others, the attorney general could withhold law enforcement grants, which could lead to rising crime. It's a threat, an effort to terrorize anyone who resists into submission. 'He's going after the voter rolls in big cities, in blue states,' said Tabitha Bonilla, an associate professor at Northwestern University's Institute for Policy Research. She sees the move as part of a larger pattern. 'For more than a decade, the Republican Party has really pushed to put restrictions in place for voting.' Hasen agrees. 'The EO should be seen as part of a broader trend on the part of some Republican officials to try to make voting and registration harder,' he said, 'as with the push to pass the SAVE Act.' The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, or SAVE Act, is essentially Trump's executive order in legislative form, minus the major coercive components. It will undoubtedly face a filibuster in the Senate, which is why Trump issued the executive order. It nevertheless passed the House of Representatives on April 10 and, in the unlikely event that it becomes law, could also disenfranchise millions of voters. For instance, its requirement that a name on an ID, like a driver's license, match that on a birth certificate could prevent millions of married women from being able to vote. Voter purges like the ones Trump is encouraging are, as Bonilla indicated, nothing new, but they have been accelerating. The Brennan Center has noted that 'jurisdictions have substantially increased the rate at which they purge voter rolls' over the past couple of decades. This did not abate in the lead-up to the 2024 election, when Republicans across the country purged voter rolls in an attempt to improve their odds of victory, with varying degrees of success. In recent years, Republicans have weaponized this process, however. In North Carolina, for instance, officials removed 747,000 names from their rolls prior to the 2024 election. They claimed they were just doing routine maintenance, and two-thirds were removed because they had died or moved. But the others—more than 200,000—were removed because the state has aggressively gone after voters deemed 'inactive' in recent years. The state's Republicans are currently trying to go even further, by challenging tens of thousands of votes that have already been counted. After losing a state Supreme Court election to incumbent Democratic Justice Allison Riggs by just 734 votes, Republican Jefferson Griffin is seeking to challenge the eligibility of more than 65,000 votes. As crazy as it sounds, he may very well prevail. He has already gotten one lower court to rule that all of those voters must prove their eligibility for their ballots to be counted. The North Carolina Supreme Court, which currently consists of five Republicans and one Democrat (with Riggs recusing herself from the case), ruled to accept 60,000 ballots. A federal judge is now set to determine the fate of the rest. North Carolina is an extreme example, but it is hardly unique. In Georgia, for instance, 455,000 names are set to be removed from the rolls this summer, many of whom should be eligible voters. Purging nearly half a million names from the rolls isn't enough for Republicans in the state's House of Representatives, who are attempting to cut ties with the Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC, a nonpartisan group that helps states maintain voter rolls. A cursory look at nine red states that have recently broken with the organization reveals why: Nearly all of them have replaced ERIC with alternatives that make it easier to purge voters. Trump's executive order is an attempt to centralize and nationalize this game plan: reduce the number of voters likely to vote Democratic to begin with, challenge any reasonably close elections that you lose, and make voters who voted against you prove they were eligible after the fact. It's not a new effort, Bonilla explained, but one that 'reenforces the movements that are already underway … to continue to remove people.' It would also likely dramatically expand those movements by introducing them in states where voting rights are far more expansive than they are in states like North Carolina and Georgia, where mass purges are commonplace. If Trump were to succeed in claiming vast powers to decide who can and can't vote, it would effectively amount to a hostile takeover of American democracy. Still, this executive order can—and likely will—be weaponized, even if none of its draconian measures ever come into effect. Say the Democrats win back control of one or both chambers of Congress in the midterms. Trump may very well argue that they did so only because they refused to comply with its dictates, indicating widespread fraud, and he may potentially use that as a pretext to order the attorney general to stop states from counting ballots that arrive after Election Day. It is a way to delegitimize election results Trump doesn't like—and might even be a pretext to attempt to overturn the results themselves. It's the culmination of an election denial movement that has only grown stronger after January 6. Most Republicans today still do not believe that Trump lost in 2020. His preposterous lies about elections rigged by unscrupulous bureaucrats and foreign invaders are now treated as gospel by much of a Republican base that is primed to doubt the legitimacy of any election the party loses. Led by a president who cannot countenance the idea of losing, Republicans are working tirelessly to ensure the party never does. For Trump, this is a question of existential importance, and not just because he doesn't want Democrats to regain power and litigate everything he's doing as president. The last time he lost power, after all, he quickly found himself embroiled in several criminal and civil cases, some of which related to his conduct as president. He may have ended up being sentenced to prison had he not won the 2024 election. He believes his political rivals were directly responsible for the legal problems that ensnared him after he left office in 2021 and likely fears returning to life as a private citizen under a Democratic president. He's also spoken recently of seeking out a third term, despite the apparent constitutional restrictions on doing so. If he decides to actually pursue this route, surely it would be nice for him to know that he'd be starting off with a field goal–like advantage, and that, if he loses, he can simply direct the attorney general to start challenging every vote that went against him. That seems a much easier route than the last time he tried to overthrow the government.
