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#Post#: 317335--------------------------------------------------
How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: LabPartner Date: April 15, 2025, 4:42 pm
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Farcical Real ID regulations swamp Secretary of State DMV
centers
Neil Steinberg
Chicago Sun-Times
HTML https://chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/2025/04/15/real-id-regulations-secretary-of-state-alexi-giannoulias
[quote]While much of the country reels from the federal
government being torn apart — jobs slashed, agencies gutted,
funding withdrawn — Alexi Giannoulias is facing the opposite
problem: a mass of new federal requirements crushing his agency.
“I haven’t been this frustrated, professionally, maybe ever,”
the Illinois secretary of state said Monday. “Because we’ve done
so much work to to create efficiencies, and they’re all being
unraveled by this unprecedented demand.”
Real ID is a ticking time bomb of security theater, signed into
law by President George W. Bush on May 11, 2005. A law designed,
basically, to keep the Sept. 11 hijackers off those planes, ex
post facto, by ensuring that people given special driver’s
licenses really, truly are who they say they are, making them
jump through documentation hoops.
“We have zero control,” said Giannoulias. “We’re required to
scan and send this information, this crazy paperwork and
documentation requirements. It’s not something we put in. We
have to take it. We have to put it in a scanner. It’s brutal.”
Years of prepping the public, begging them not to wait until the
last minute, proved insufficient, and now collective lifetimes
evaporate in blocklong lines as frustrated Illinoisans battle to
DMV windows only to find their paperwork not in order.
“I had carefully reviewed the Real ID checklist on the website
and believed I had the required documentation,” wrote my
neighbor, an insurance executive who often travels by air.
Normally the most placid person, I bumped into her, irate,
coming back from another failed attempt to get her Real ID,
thwarted because she changed her name when she got married.
“The need for a marriage certificate to verify a name change
should be called out more explicitly — especially as it often
applies to women,” she wrote in a complaint I nudged in
Giannoulias’ direction, prompting our conversation. “It’s an
easy detail to miss, and not something people carry daily. Yet
it can derail the entire process.”
Nor is this a local problem. From coast to coast, DMV offices
are swamped.
“This is national. It’s literally chaos and mayhem around the
country,” said Giannoulias. “In Florida, they’re sleeping in
their cars, in tents, in front of the DMV. Other states are
shutting down their systems.”
[i]And for what? To create reams of data that former staffers
who are no longer at decimated federal bureaus won’t ever look
at.
“I’m not a national security expert,” said Giannoulias. “But to
me, it seems an enormous waste of time and resources for this
little star on your license.”
For the last 20 years the government has been kicking the can
down the road, pushing the deadline back. They must have once
thought it important: “Emergency” is right there in the title.
“Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the
Global War on Terror, and Tsunami Relief.”
Yet without Real ID, no American plane has been hijacked since
9/11. The only terror being inflicted is by Real ID, stressing
already traumatized communities.
“It is overwhelmingly immigrants,” said Giannoulias. “It’s tough
for us to get data on it, but I will tell you, 1000% accurate,
because I go to these facilities. I go to Chinatown, go to the
supercenter, take a gander at a line going around the block.
These are almost all immigrants, Spanish-speaking folks, people
who are scared [witless] that without a Real ID they will not
have proper identification, that they’re going to be deported or
cannot drive a vehicle. They’re coming in with their kids.
They’re scared.”
The reason this all matters is that unless you have that star,
or a valid passport — and half of Americans don’t — you won’t be
able to get on a plane after May 7. Unless you still can.
Nothing is certain. Homeland Security speaks vaguely of a
“phased enforcement approach” running through May 7, 2027.
“We don’t know,” Giannoulias said. “The TSA and Homeland
Security have been throwing out mixed messages. Now potentially
there is a two-year enforcement period. Maybe they send you to
the back of the line. Maybe a warning. They have no idea what
they’re doing. It’s crazy.”
Giannoulias said that his 4,000 employees are doing their best.
“They’re burned out,” he said. “They’re working Saturdays.
They’re working overtime. They’re killing themselves.”
He said that while employees are stressed, they’re coping.
“People in our office have stepped up,” he said. “I could not be
more proud of our team and the work they’re doing.”
So what should Illinoisans do?
“People need to take their time, relax,” said Giannoulias.
If you can wait until after May 7, get your Real IDs then.
“If you’re not traveling now, wait,” Giannoulias said. “Don’t
get stuck in lines if you don’t have to.”[/i][/quote]
(Emphasis added)
#Post#: 317338--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: muskrat Date: April 15, 2025, 4:57 pm
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i got my realid way back in fall 2019 bc the then-deadline was
looming and i was afraid of not being able to travel. (covid
pushed back the deadline.) i havent given it any thought since
then.
i had no clue the requirement was putting such an issuing and
data reporting onus on local officials and freaking out
immigrants. and no one at the fed level will even be monitoring
the data.
what a goatrope.
#Post#: 317342--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: MidwestmikkiJ Date: April 15, 2025, 5:19 pm
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I got mine 3 or 4 years ago. I’ll have to go through a bunch of
it again when we move but now I know how to make sure I have the
right paperwork.
I did have trouble with mine the fist time because one document
was off by by 1 day. At that time it took so long to get an
appointment with the DMV that the 30 days the document was good
for passed.
#Post#: 317344--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: pamelaaos Date: April 15, 2025, 5:23 pm
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Since my regular license was expiring this year, I took a
boatload of documentation with me - divorce and marriage
certificates to trace my name back to my birth certificate and
got my RealId. In Virginia.
My concern now is that the SAVE act, which the House passed and
sent to the Senate, will only accept RealIds from states that
put your birthplace or your citizenship on it. Virginia doesn't
have that. So now, if we move and I have to re-register to vote,
I won't be able to. I'm so frustrated because that means I'm
going to have to spend the money (and the aggravation similar to
all the documentation I took for my RealId) and get a passport.
It's so stupid and ridiculous.
#Post#: 317363--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: Aardtacha Date: April 15, 2025, 6:49 pm
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I've had it since I renewed my license in '22. I don't recall
that it was particularly a pain to get -- we'd needed a bunch of
documentation to get DH his state ID (he doesn't drive) so we
just grabbed the file with all our stuff* when we went.
*The file wasn't for the ID; we'd needed to renew our passports
a couple months earlier, so we had everything together for that.
#Post#: 317368--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: farmgirl Date: April 15, 2025, 7:05 pm
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Neither my husband or I have Real IDs. We have passports
because we leave the country every year.
Do we actually NEED to get real IDs?
It is not a small thing if we (or mostly I) need to get birth
certificates. Husband was born in Minneapolis, but I was born
in the middle of nowhere in Nebraska.
#Post#: 317371--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: LabPartner Date: April 15, 2025, 7:19 pm
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[quote author=farmgirl link=topic=3481.msg317368#msg317368
date=1744761936]
Neither my husband or I have Real IDs. We have passports
because we leave the country every year.
Do we actually NEED to get real IDs?
It is not a small thing if we (or mostly I) need to get birth
certificates. Husband was born in Minneapolis, but I was born
in the middle of nowhere in Nebraska.
[/quote]
A passport seems to be enough to fly domestically.
#Post#: 317372--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: armybrat1 Date: April 15, 2025, 7:20 pm
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I got my RealID from Maryland in about 2021. Maryland fought
against the rules when Bush and Trump were President; but
thought it's a marvelous idea when Obama and Biden were in
office.
My only problem was the one I always have: I do not have an
acceptable birth certificate. My birth certificate is entirely
in German, and that apparently fails the rules. Fortunately, I
got a passport about 20 years ago (that's a long story) and used
that in place of the birth certificate. I have to give the
Maryland MVA full credit. I made the appointment. I walked in to
the office 3 minutes ahead of time; I was called to the desk one
minute later; and I walked out with RealID license three minutes
after that. Seriously - I was all done one minute after the
appointment time.
#Post#: 317388--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: Lurknomore Date: April 15, 2025, 10:50 pm
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Got my REALID easily in WA state about 2 mos ago. Had to wait
about 5 seconds and was there maybe 5 minutes and even got a
decent photo for a change! And even an 👁️ test as
I no longer need 🤓 to drive since cataract surgery.
It’s easier to carry than passport.
Had gotten a passport a couple yrs ago too, but haven’t used
that, and now doubt I will, for multiple reasons.
But I’m all set!
#Post#: 317389--------------------------------------------------
Re: How is the REAL ID working for you?
By: kkt Date: April 15, 2025, 10:57 pm
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I got stars upon thars!
When the Kid was getting their first state ID card, in 2019, it
was a RealID. When I had to get my driver's license renewed a
couple of months later, I got a RealID one. I haven't been on a
domestic US flight since. I guess it's a backup, just in case
my passport is lost, expired, or confiscated by a fascist
government. It wasn't that hard to collect the paperwork for us
and our appointments went smoothly.
(German is against the rules? wtf? It's not like it's in
Tibetan or something.)
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