DHS Extends REAL ID Deadline to May 7, 2025
By Yehudit
Garmaise
New Yorkers who have been meaning to upgrade their driver’s licenses to REAL IDs just got a two-year extension.
Now that the
US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) again extended its REAL ID enforcement
deadline to May 7, 2025, Americans now have 24 more months to obtain the new
form of ID that will be required to board domestic flights for adults 18 and
older.
REAL IDs will
not replace drivers licenses or passports for international travel, and
children need not provide them as long as they are traveling with adults who
can provide REAL IDs.
Several years
ago, DHS set its REAL ID compliance date as April 27, 2020, but the pandemic
forced the federal agency to extend its deadline multiple times.
The most
recent deadline to require REAL IDs, which DHS will require Transportation
Security Administration (TSA) agents to check before Americans travel
domestically, quickly approaching on May 3, 2023.
Now TSA agents
will not check REAL IDs for two and a half more years, announced DHS, which
attributed its latest extension to ongoing backlogs in the NY Department of
Motor Vehicles (DMV), patch.com reported.
Since 2017,
NY DMVs have been issuing REAL IDs, which resulted from a law the US Congress
passed in 2005 to increase security measures after the 9/11 terrorist attacks
in 2001.
REAL IDs
employ new technology that makes them much harder to forge, said DHS, which
added that REAL IDs would feature stars that indicate their compliance.
To obtain REAL IDs, applicants must provide a passport or birth certificate, a Social Security card or tax return, and two documents proving proof of residence, such as a mortgage or rental receipt and a utility bill, DHS explained.