DHS Delays Enforcement of REAL ID Law
The Department of Homeland Security has given states an additional two years to fully comply with a requirement that all driver's licenses and other forms of identification have tamperproof provisions to board aircraft at U.S. airports.
“Effective January 22, 2018, air travelers with a driver’s license or identification card issued by a state that does not meet the requirements of the REAL ID Act (unless that state has been granted an extension to comply with the act) must present an alternative form of identification acceptable to TSA in order to board a commercial domestic flight,” Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said in a Jan. 8 statement.
“Over the next two years, those states that are not REAL ID compliant are strongly encouraged to meet the requirements of the law for the benefit of their residents.”
The final phase of the law was to have gone into effect this month but was delayed to give the states more time to comply.
The statement did not address requirements to gain entrance to federal facilities.
At present, only 23 states are fully compliant with the REAL ID Act, but DHS has used its authority to grant 27 states and U.S. territories extensions because they have demonstrated steps toward compliance, DHS said.
DHS said six states and territories – Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, New Mexico, Washington, and American Samoa – are noncompliant and do not currently have extensions.
The REAL ID law was passed in 2005 by Congress after the 9/11 Commission recommended that the U.S. government set standards for the issuance of “sources of identification, such as driver’s licenses.”
The commission recognized that “sources of identification are the last opportunity to ensure that people are who they say they are and to check whether they are terrorists,” DHS said.
For a license or identification card to be REAL ID compliant, the state issuing it must incorporate anticounterfeit technology into the card, verify the applicant’s identity and conduct background checks for employees involved in issuing driver’s licenses.
