DHS Delays REAL ID Deadline Another Two Years

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced it was extending the deadline by roughly two years for air passengers to use a REAL ID when traveling.

The agency announced on December 5, 2022 it will begin enforcing the more stringent identification requirement on May 7, 2025, after previously setting a deadline of May 3, 2023. The announcement marks DHS’s third pandemic-related extension.

The requirement was set to go into effect in 2020, but the agency began granting extensions as the pandemic shut down departments of motor vehicles and other identification-issuing agencies.

Monday’s announcement marks the third pandemic-related extension of the requirement’s expansion to air travel.

DHS first granted an extension until October 2021 before issuing a second extension to May 2023, making the latest announcement the longest extension yet of roughly two years.