Montana reps who once fought REAL ID mum as TSA plans enforcement

For years, the elected officials representing Montana in Washington, D.C., resisted the implementation of federally mandated REAL ID requirements, articulating concerns about privacy and overreach that helped delay enforcement of the long-contested post-9/11 security measure for more than two decades.

This week, as the Transportation Security Administration announced plans to charge air travelers without REAL ID-compliant identification a $45 fee, the state’s federal delegation had little to say on the topic.

“Senator Daines supports Montanans’ freedom to choose whether or not they participate in Real ID,” a spokesperson for Sen. Steve Daines wrote in response to a question from Montana Free Press about whether the state’s senior U.S. senator — who once sponsored legislation repealing the measure — approves of the new security fee.

A spokesperson for eastern Montana U.S. Rep. Troy Downing declined to comment. The offices of Sen. Tim Sheehy and western Montana U.S. Rep. Ryan Zinke didn’t respond to emailed questions from MTFP on Monday or Tuesday. All four delegates are Republicans.

Following pushback from the state Legislature, Montanans were blocked from getting a REAL ID for a decade, but that law was effectively repealed in 2017. Residents can now obtain REAL ID-compliant state-issued driver’s licenses, although the process requires them to submit extra documentation and pay a $25 surcharge.

While the TSA stated this week that the vast majority of air passengers nationwide, 94%, are already complying with REAL ID requirements, figures from the Montana Department of Justice indicate that many Montanans still have non-compliant driver’s licenses.

The Montana Department of Justice said Tuesday that 42% of active Montana driver’s licenses are  REAL ID compliant. That’s up by more than 10 percentage points from a 30% figure for a year ago.

The TSA said Monday that, as of Feb. 1, passengers who can’t present a REAL ID-compliant driver’s license or other federally approved identification at airport security will be required to pay the $45 fee “to use a modernized alternative identity verification system.”

Allowable alternatives to a state-issued driver’s license with the REAL ID stamp of approval include passports, Department of Defense IDs and some photo IDs issued by federally recognized tribal governments.

“The REAL ID law was signed more than 20 years ago, but previous presidential administrations failed to properly implement it,” TSA officials said in a release. “Under President Trump’s leadership, the law was finally implemented and enforced by Secretary Kristi Noem as of May 7, 2025.”

The Trump administration announced in May that it would begin enforcing the long-delayed REAL ID requirement, saying that travelers with noncompliant IDs would be allowed to fly but that they could be diverted for extra screening.

The REAL ID Act, passed in 2005 following the 9/11 terror attacks of 2001, specified national standards for driver’s licenses and identification cards, responding to concerns that lax state-level requirements could provide openings for criminals and terrorists to obtain fraudulent identity documents. It requires identification that meets its standards for purposes such as boarding federally regulated commercial aircraft, entering nuclear power plants and accessing federal facilities, including military bases and federal courthouses.

The Montana federal delegation’s longest-serving members, Daines and Zinke, both opposed the REAL ID requirement earlier in their political careers, supporting legislation that would have repealed it.

“While maintaining security standards is important, we cannot allow the federal government to infringe on our right to privacy and strip Montana of our state sovereignty,” Zinke told the Great Falls Tribune in 2016.

“We’re going to draw a hard line here and not stand down to the federal government’s overreach,” Daines said as he proposed a repeal bill in 2016, according to the Associated Press.

According to the AP, Montana federal delegates and state officials were concerned about requirements in the REAL ID law that required the federal government to store images of birth certificates and other documents presented as proof of identity, worrying that information could be subject to a breach and used to track law-abiding U.S. citizens. 

Then-Montana Attorney General Tim Fox called the measure an “Orwellian national ID system.” The AP reported in 2016 that the Montana Department of Justice under Fox, a Republican, had chosen at that point to issue driver’s licenses with enhanced security measures that explicitly didn’t comply with REAL ID.

A DOJ spokesman said Tuesday that Montanans can schedule REAL ID appointments online, with same-day appointments available in many cases. More information about acquiring REAL IDs is available from the department’s Motor Vehicle Division at mvdmt.gov/real-id.