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No Star on Your ID by 5/7? Can’t Fly or Enter US Facilities. Want to Vote? Show Your Papers. [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-04-25
Real ID
If you renewed your drivers license recently, you may have had to prove that you lived at your address, in order to get a “Real ID”. Beginning 7 May 2025, less than 2 weeks from today, a Real ID will be required to board a flight in the US or to enter federal facilities like military bases. In California, a real id has the star inside the bear above, and in other states there’s usually some kind of star in the upper right corner. Real IDs are often available for non-drivers.
“Now, the Star-Belly Sneetches had bellies with stars. The Plain-Belly Sneetches had none upon thars.” —Dr Seuss
What is a Legal Address?
The US Post Office now keeps a database of legal addresses. The US government only recognizes legal addresses. And financial institutions, like banks and brokerages, also require legal addresses. If you do not maintain a legal address on file, your bank is required to close your accounts.
If you use a US PO Box, that’s not a legal address. If you use a virtual mailbox, private mailing service, or mail forwarding firm, those are not legal addresses. Many of these firms use misleading advertising to suggest that they will give you “a street address”, but the US Post Office recognizes those street addresses as PO Boxes and therefore not legal addresses. The US Post Office will only forward to these addresses temporarily, and they may warn you that they will not accept a change of address form from these addresses, since they’re not legal.
If you use a friend or relative’s address to receive mail, that may work temporarily, but the US Postal Service is cracking down on multiple names for the same address. There have been a rash of title scams, where virtual squatters have gained “residency” of infrequently occupied property in order to “sell” or take out loans, fraudulently.
Even if you have a Real ID, the Post Office may still require you to go in person to verify it. And that means going to one of the relatively few main branch offices that are designated to verify Real IDs. So, if you need to temporarily change your address to care for an elderly relative, you may need to prove your current address by driving past your local post office to go to the nearest large city branch that can officially check your Real ID. So be sure to tell your relative to inform you at least a week or so before they suddenly fall ill.
Who is Screwed?
Officially, there are less than 800,000 homeless people in the US. They can’t get a Real ID.
There are probably over 3 million Americans who live full time in RVs, vans and are otherwise nomads. They may think they can get a Real ID, but in many cases, they can’t.
Less than ½ of Americans have a valid US passport or passport card. If you are in the lucky minority, then you can use those to board a plane.
If you are temporarily staying with a friend or living with a partner, you probably won’t have your name on the utility bills, bank statements, lease agreement or mortgage for that address, so you can’t get a Real ID.
If you have been displaced by a natural disaster, fire, eviction or other issue and are temporarily staying in a hotel or shelter, you won’t be eligible for a Real ID until you resolve your living situation.
If you physically can’t go to a USPS Identity Verification Facility, you may not be eligible to complete a change of address. That can make it difficult to establish a new legal address and get a Real ID.
Why Now?
For many years, every time Republicans pushed a bill to require Americans to carry official documentation, a Congressman representing San Mateo in California would rise. And he would tell his story.
During WWII, Tom Lantos was a Hungarian teenager when Hitler invaded. As a Jew, he was arrested and thrown in a concentration camp. He escaped. Then he was caught, beaten and thrown back in the camp. Then he escaped again and joined Wallenberg’s—a Swedish diplomat—underground. Eventually, he moved to the states and was elected to Congress, the only Holocaust survivor to serve. Steven Spielberg produced a film, The Last Days , telling the story too.
Congressman Lantos would tell his colleagues how fearful he and his friends and family felt during the war when they would have to produce their papers on demand under Nazi occupation. And he would tell his colleagues of how much safer the survivors felt in the US, knowing that the government could not demand to see their papers on demand. And he would look them in the eyes and shame them for trying to make our country more like Nazi Germany. And they would be uncomfortably silent for a while, and then their legislation would fail.
Time and time again, the Congressman from San Mateo would rise to tell his story, serving until he was 80, and every time, Tom Lantos would stop the requirement for US citizens to carry documentation. Sadly, Lantos died in 2008, and Congress has now forgotten his story and too many Republicans have embraced the Nazi way.
“Show Your Papers”
Above and beyond the proof of legal address, if you live in Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Vermont or Washington, you may have had to prove your US citizenship to get an id with a flag or the word “enhanced” on it. New Hampshire, Louisiana and Wyoming now require proof of citizenship to register to vote.
If you have changed your name as a result of marriage, to protect yourself from threats or out of choice to be who you are, then your current name will not match your birth certificate. This will make it very difficult to get a Real ID enhanced to show citizenship.
If you do not have easy access to your birth certificate, marriage certificate or name change proof, you will have difficulty getting a Real ID showing proof of citizenship.
Last week the House passed the SAVE—Safeguard American Voter Eligibility—Act, which imposes voter ID requirements on Americans. The vote was narrow on party lines, and Republicans have taken the first step requiring Americans to carry their papers and to show them to government officials on demand. Americans without papers will have less freedom if the legislation passes the Republican Senate and is signed by the Republican President.
Tell your Senator to vote against the SAVE Act.
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