Every adult must maintain a current government-issued photo ID verifying identity and citizenship status.
Meaning ┃ Evidence ┃ Impact ┃Solution┃Summary
What Is Best for the Common Good?
Evidence is noted in [ ]
I. Recap
Q1 | MEANING
This claim proposes a universal identity standard. Every adult in the United States must hold and keep current one government-issued photo credential - or one for identity and one for citizenship - answering three requirements: Who are you? May you be here? And, are you a citizen? Identity is confirmed by ten fingerprints and both iris images, collected at enrollment and at each renewal.
It is a duty to possess, not to carry. It applies to residents and visitors staying longer than ninety days. It builds on the REAL ID standard, now met by every state, and on the Enhanced Driver’s License, which has proven citizenship in five states since 2009. Both are voluntary today. This claim proposes the first unconditional requirement.
Q2 | EVIDENCE
Our registry holds 92 facts: 43 affirming, 22 dissenting, and 27 neutral. Every fact links to its source so you can check it yourself. For each fact we verified two things: Its lane - Affirming, Dissenting, or Neutral; and that the source actually states what we summarize. How much weight each fact deserves is up to you.
Q3 | IMPACT
The seven sub-claim results, in one line each:
▪ SC-1 The harm is large, growing, and officially measured. What is not measured is the share a credential would address.
▪ SC-2 Current systems are insufficient, flawed, and under attack. This is the strongest sub-claim.
▪ SC-3 The method works and has for forty years. Its magnitude is unmeasured.
▪ SC-4 The burden is real and lands on identifiable groups, but most of it is a matter of how the law is written.
▪ SC-5 The surveillance the public fears is already here and was built without any credential. A better index is not a new power - but it is not harmless either.
▪ SC-6 We cannot validate this sub-claim. The program is costed only by its opponents.
▪ SC-7 The systems exist and are national. Feasibility is not the obstacle - the schedule and the legal mechanism are.
UNKNOWNS
Everything below remains open. We state these rather than fill them with estimates:
1. How much harm a universal credential would prevent. We can prove the method works and that the problem is large. Nobody has measured the connection.
2. What a universal requirement would cost. Every figure available comes from an organization opposed to it. None assess the cost of merely adding to existing systems.
3. The cost and risk carried in the overstay population - 538,548 events in one year, with no research quantifying what it means to manage or enforce.[N-000100]
4. What share of counterfeit documents is intercepted versus active. Seizure counts are floors; the denominator is unknown.[A-000077, A-000078]
5. Whether statutory use restrictions hold under a universal system.[A-000071, D-000087, D-000112]
6. Public support for this claim as stated. The available national-identification polling is two decades old and asked about carrying a card and about fingerprints - neither of which this claim requires.
7. Whether the Supreme Court would permit a federal mandate on the states where national security is the interest. It has never ruled on that question,[N-000147] and the doctrine as written forecloses the argument.[D-000146] Section 13 proposes the path that does not require an answer.
II. Solution
OBJECTIVE: What’s best for the common good?
Identity is one cornerstone of every safeguard for the American republic. Background checks, watchlists, benefit eligibility, employment authorization, and border screening all assume the system knows who a person is. When that assumption fails, every protection built on top of it fails with it - risking national security and public safety.
Three cases demonstrate the costs of not having an effective .
One. Stolen from children.
Corey Cato, sentenced September 2022 to 94 months in federal prison, ordered to pay $1,908,481 in restitution.
Cato and co-conspirators created synthetic identities by combining false names and dates of birth with the Social Security numbers of real people, then used those identities and fake ID documents to open bank and credit card accounts. The stolen Social Security numbers included those belonging to children.
He rented an Atlanta apartment under the name “Jason Brown” using a stolen Social Security number and a fake California driver’s license, and maintained a mail drop where the synthetic identities received their bank statements while insulating his real address from detection.
The children whose numbers he used will find out years from now, when they apply for a first loan.
Source: U.S. Attorney’s Office, Central District of California, press release
https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/georgia-man-sentenced-over-7-years-prison-synthetic-identities-scheme-defrauded-banks
Two. Eight IDs from one DMV.
The 9/11 Commission staff report found that all but one hijacker obtained some form of state identification, and that six used those state IDs to check in for their flights on September 11.
Seven of the nineteen fraudulently obtained authentic driver’s licenses through the Virginia DMV.
The mechanism, stated by the Commission’s own sources: Airline personnel told 9/11 Commission staff that the Virginia IDs let the hijackers appear assimilated and avoid the greater scrutiny that showing Saudi, Lebanese, or UAE passports would likely have triggered - scrutiny that, according to those personnel, would likely have uncovered the knives and pepper spray they carried, potentially foiling the plot.
The failure was at issuance: Virginia’s requirements were loose enough that unscrupulous lawyers and notaries ran a thriving market processing applicants, with forms that were easy to fake accepted in place of standard proofs.
The documents were real. The identities behind them were not. That is the failure this claim exists to close.
Source: 9/11 Commission staff report, “9/11 and Terrorist Travel,” Chapter 2
https://www.9-11commission.gov/staff_statements/911_TerrTrav_Ch2.pdf
Already in our registry as A-000065 and A-000124.
Three. A murderer with four credentials.
Johnny Lee Allen was convicted of second-degree murder in Nebraska in 1999 and sentenced to 35 to 50 years. He was released in April 2019. Four months later he used a stolen identity to obtain a Wyoming ID card. Then an Oregon identification card with the same stolen identity. Then an Oregon driver’s license. Then a second Oregon license using his brother’s name.
He used those fraudulently obtained documents in multiple firearm transactions. He cancelled twice when the background check was delayed, and obtained a pistol anyway through someone else. A convicted murderer, absconded from parole, defeated three state issuance processes and used the credentials to try to buy guns.
This claim and related claims seek to eliminate this risk
Source: U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Oregon, press release
https://www.justice.gov/usao-or/pr/man-parole-after-murder-conviction-sentenced-prison-identity-theft-and-making-false
What the three have in common.
None of these failures happened at the moment the credential was shown. All three happened at the counter where the credential was applied for, approved (federal or state), and issued. Our current system to accurately confirm an individual’s identity is broken, and therefore dangerous to citizens.
A credential’s strength is dependent on the process and people who deliver it.
Americans must have a system that accurately connects a person to their real identity, or exposes a poser. This is not surveillance. It is the opposite: It is the difference between taking reasonable steps to maintain national security and public safety versus irresponsibly extending opportunities for evil to be inflicted on citizens and visitors to our nation.
What we expect this claim to do about illegal immigration.
We expect a universal credential recording citizenship status to help limit and better manage illegal immigration. That is a national security and public safety benefit.
Federal statisticians estimate between 11 and 14 million illegal immigrants live in the United States.[N-000114, N-000115]
Illegal immigrant credentials: Nineteen states and the District of Columbia issue credentials to illegal immigrants, marked as invalid for federal purposes.[N-000118] To establish who the applicant is, those states accept a foreign birth certificate, foreign passport, or consular card, and in one state a sworn affidavit.[A-000119]
Foreign credentials: No American authority can verify those records against the government that issued them.
Documents we cannot verify are more vulnerable to fraud than documents we can, and that is not theoretical: A September 11 hijacker was admitted on a passport carrying fraudulent stamps the inspector did not detect and, in the Commission’s own assessment, could not have been expected to detect.[A-000124]
Congress was wrong to build that structure into the REAL ID program because these loopholes violate federal immigration laws and possibly other laws.
REAL ID was enacted to close the gap the 9/11 Commission identified, But unfortunately politicians designed the solution to enable states to create national security and public safety risks by allowing people to remain in the country who are here against the law.
Instead, REAL ID Section 202(d)(11) authorized a second tier of credentials,[N-000122] federal law left states free to extend benefits to illegal immigrants by affirmative state statute,[N-000123] and nineteen states filled that tier with people whose presence federal law makes unlawful.
Three states have since passed laws refusing to recognize those credentials from other states.[D-000121]
Whether the loophole was carelessness or something else, we let you decide The failure is federal, and it is a failure of design.
This claim does not validate that failure. Nor does it address enforcement, removal, or who should be admitted - those are immigration questions belonging to existing law and potential future claims in this library.
This claim has three components: Are you who you say you are? Are you authorized to be here? And, are you a citizen? For millions of people, no current document except a passport answers the last two.
We say this with respect for immigrants, including those here unlawfully, most of whom work hard and harm no one. Fair laws, applied to everyone, are what the common good requires.
A country that cannot control its borders and criminals, cannot maintain its covenant identity, personal safety, and resources.
OUR VERDICT
The facts support this claim - conditionally.
#1 - Cost
Six of seven sub-claims survived the evidence. The seventh, cost, we could not validate, because no independent or official estimate of a universal requirement exists.[D-000088, D-000089]
We do not treat this as fatal, because the infrastructure is already built and paid for: Every state issues a compliant credential today,[N-000093] and the national fingerprint index has run since 1983.[A-000075]
The question is what it costs to extend a system, not to build one - which no one has calculated.
#2 - Surveillance
SC-5 discussed concerns this claim might expand government surveillance. Q3 concluded this claim is an opportunity for citizens to confirm the structure of this law - in contrast to REAL ID - respects their rights, reinforces laws designed for national security and public safety, increases reporting of non-confidential information, and simplifies fair, strict accountability in how this law is administered.
The key regarding surveillance concerns is how the law is written, monitored, and violations prosecuted.
This should become law only with the limits based on Section 9 (below) written into it. A version of this law without those limits is a different proposal, and we do not support it.
#3 - Enactment
▪ The Supreme Court has held that Congress cannot compel a state to enact or enforce a federal program, or reach the same result by directing the state’s own officers. [D-000146, A-000148] (Sections 4, 13)
However, no case establishing that rule involved national security or foreign policy,[N-000147]
▪ If no new information is found to overcome the concern with the Supreme Court, then we advocate this law be enacted the way REAL ID was: The requirement then falls on the person, not the state.
Federal law sets the standard, declines to recognize anything that does not meet it, and preempts any state credential that contradicts a federal determination of status.[A-000148, A-000149] That approach compelled no state and still reached 94 percent compliance.[A-000070]
However, separate of the challenge of homeless people maintaining current identity, the intent of this law is 100% citizen compliance, not the 94% achieved by REAL ID.
WHAT THE LAW MUST INCLUDE
Every requirement below comes from Q2 | Evidence, where the bracketed numbers can be found, and each points to the section of the draft law that delivers it:
1. One credential answering all three requirements - identity, lawful status, and citizenship - because a card that answers the first two forces every institution to verify the third separately, at its own cost, and leaves the status of millions unrecorded.[A-000113, N-000114, N-000115] (Sections 3, 8)
2. One person, one record. A card cannot confirm this by itself. It requires ten fingerprints and both iris images checked against a shared record at issuance and each renewal - the combination produces more than ten times fewer errors than either method alone.[A-000125, A-000126] (Section 6)
3. Issuance integrity. The process of enrollment, management of updates, and renewal must include multiple verification checks to avoid criminal violations and administrative errors. Two states enrolled thousands of people improperly through ordinary administrative failure.[A-000059, A-000060] (Section 6)
4. Verification of foreign source documents, or a stated limit on what they can establish. No American authority can check a foreign birth certificate, passport, or consular card against its issuing government, and fraud in such a document went undetected at the border in a case the 9/11 Commission examined. Also, certain foreign governments or their employees may endorse fraudulent identification that may support anti-American activities.[A-000119, A-000124] (Section 6)
5. A free credential and free source documents for those who meet a state’s standard of need - the average card costs $54 before the documents required to apply, and the full cost of a nominally free ID runs $75 to $175.[D-000081, D-000032] (Section 7)
6. An end to the circular barrier, where a birth certificate is required to get an ID and an ID is required to get a birth certificate.[D-000083] (Section 7)
7. Mobile units staffed by government employees, reaching people who cannot reach an office.[D-000082] (Section 7)
8. A path for people without an address, because the two-proofs-of-residence rule does not merely burden them - as written, it disqualifies them.[D-000082] (Section 5)
9. A list of permitted uses, a private right of action, and access logs the individual can inspect - consistent with existing law - because restrictions on identity data have been violated, and statutory limits have eroded before.[D-000086, D-000087] (Section 9)
10. Personal liability for intentional misuse. Organizational penalties alone did not stop officers from using database access to stalk former partners.[D-000087] (Section 10)
11. Identity confirmed against the credential, not inferred from a probabilistic match. Federal and state law enforcement should confirm identity against the credential and its biometric record. (Section 11)
12. Stated enrollment objectives at the outset and monthly public reporting against them, so the law is measured against what it promised rather than against how it feels. (Sections 2, 12)
13. A temporary service corps to facilitate the enrollment, because the agencies that would do this work are already at capacity.[D-000133, D-000134] (Section 13)
14. No net increase in cost to the government, by funding the program from a modest driver’s license fee or federal fee rather than from general revenue. States make their own funding decisions. Should federal funding be necessary for new equipment and a temporary service corps, that appropriation must be built into this law. (Section 7)
Any fee or appropriation authorized by this law ends with the five-year implementation schedule and may not be extended. New federal law approved by the voters is the only way to continue federal funding beyond that term. (Section 7)
III. Implementation
Simple Liberty Foundation is an educational organization. We research, publish, and teach. We do not lobby or endorse candidates. This research is a first step in public education on this claim. The next steps are:
▪ Engage with individuals - Simple Liberty Members and others - in civil dialog on the facts of this claim, to sharpen the key details.
▪ Study and engage with organizations that came before us with similar proposals, including those that oppose this one, to consider their research and results.
▪ Seek the cost estimate this claim could not find. Of everything unresolved, this is the gap most likely to be closed by someone willing to do the work.
▪ Publish, as education for the people and their representatives: The model law that follows, refined by what we learn; a constitutional analysis of how federal and state responsibilities align; what the law requires, who implements it, and on what schedule; and a list of laws that become unnecessary if it passes.
Whether to act on this education belongs where it always has: With the people and those they elect.
IV. The Draft Law
MODEL LAW - FOR EDUCATION AND PUBLIC DISCUSSION. This is not filed legislation. It is a teaching draft, written in plain language, showing what a law that honors the evidence would say. A state legislature could adapt it for state credentials; Congress could adapt it for the federal standard.
THE IDENTITY AND CITIZENSHIP VERIFICATION ACT
Section 1 - Name.
This law may be called the Identity and Citizenship Verification Act.
Section 2 - Why This Law Exists, and What It Must Achieve.
The enacting body finds that:
▪ Identity is one cornerstone of every safeguard for the American republic. When the system cannot accurately confirm who a person is, then background checks, watchlists, benefit rules, and employment authorization all fail together.
▪ Counterfeit credentials are cheap, and some of them work. Documents that scan correctly have been seized by the tens of thousands, and generative tools have lowered the skill required to make them.
▪ Issuance can accidentally fail without fraud. Two states enrolled thousands of people improperly through ordinary administrative error, undetected for up to three years.
▪ No law requires an adult to hold identification at all. Every current requirement is a condition on an activity a person may decline.
Between 11 and 14 million illegal immigrants live in the country, and the leading estimates differ by millions. A country that cannot confidently state a reasonably accurate estimate of the number of people here illegally cannot limit the risk or resolve the problem.
▪ Extensive government data collection already exists and was built without any national credential. This law improves accuracy.
The enacting body further declares the objectives this law must achieve, against which it shall be measured under Section 12:
▪ Every eligible adult holds a current credential.
▪ No eligible person is denied one for cost, distance, or lack of an address.
▪ One person holds one identity record.
▪ No use of credential data occurs outside the list in Section 9.
Section 3 - Definitions.
In this law:
▪ “Credential” means a current photo identification document issued by a federal, state, or federally recognized tribal government that meets or exceeds the federal minimum standard and records the holder’s citizenship status. The requirement may be met by one document, or by one for identity and one for citizenship.
▪ “Maintain” means to obtain the credential, keep it unexpired, and update it when name, address, or status changes. It does not mean to carry it.
▪ “Adult” means a person eighteen years of age or older.
▪ “One person, one record” means that no individual holds more than one active identity record in the system.
Section 4 - What Every Adult Must Do.
Every adult present in the United States shall maintain a credential. This is a duty to possess. This claim does not address how it is enforced.
This duty falls on the person. No state is required to issue the credential, and no state officer is required to administer this law. A state may decline to participate; its credentials then do not satisfy this standard, and its residents obtain one through the federal channel established under Section 13.
Section 5 - Who Must Comply, and When.
▪ A visitor present ninety days or less satisfies this law with the credential their own government issued and the record of their admission.
▪ Any person present longer than ninety days shall hold an American credential meeting the standards of this law. Duration is the trigger, not status.
▪ Presence is counted as cumulative days within a rolling twelve-month period, not days since the most recent entry.
▪ A new resident, or a person reaching the age of eighteen, has ninety days to obtain the credential.
A person without a fixed address shall not be denied a credential for that reason. The enacting body shall establish an alternative to the two-proofs-of-residence requirement combined with the biometric - 10 fingerprint and both eye iris scan - requirement. Approaches used elsewhere for alternative yet stable addresses include a shelter or service-provider address of record, a designated agent, or a declaration made under penalty of perjury. The selection is the choice of the participating state. The federal government decides which option for states, if any, that decline to participate.
Section 6 - Issuance Integrity.
The issuing agency shall:
▪ Scan every source document and transmit the files to the appropriate federal agency for verification against its issuing authority before the credential is produced.
▪ Where a source document was issued by a foreign government, no American authority can verify it against the issuing record. The enacting federal agency shall define what such a document may establish and what it may not, rather than treat it as equivalent to a verifiable record.
▪ Collect ten fingerprints and both iris images at enrollment, and confirm before the credential is produced that the applicant is not already enrolled under another name. Confirm the same types of enrollment data at the time of renewal.
▪ Audit a sample of issuances each month and report the error rate under Section 12.
▪ Log every issuance decision, including the identity of the employee who made it, date and time stamped.
Section 7 - Who Pays.
No person shall be charged for the cost of a credential required by this law who meets the state’s standard of need. Each state shall set that standard and fund the program. For those who qualify, the state shall also provide at no charge:
▪ The source documents this law requires, including birth certificates.
▪ Mobile issuance units, staffed by government employees, serving communities distant from a permanent office, who follow a similar process as used for in person registration.
The enacting state body can fund this program from a modest increase in the standard driver’s license fee and/or other fees rather than from general revenue, so that the requirement imposes no net increase in cost to state government. Appropriations may be adjusted for inflation each year.
Section 8 - What the Credential Records.
Every credential shall record, legibly on its face: The holder’s identity, the holder’s lawful status, and whether the holder is a citizen of the United States. A credential issued to a person whose authorization has a term shall show that term. The term may not exceed ten years.
Section 9 - Limits on Use.
Government entities are limited in their use of data from these credentials as follows:
▪ This law does not change existing law pertaining to how government agencies may use credential information to carry out their functions, even if the systems managing this data becomes upgraded as part of this law.
▪ Individuals are given a simple, secure process to revise their information as needed, due to change in residence, marriage, divorce, and other pertinent personal information.
▪ Each access to a person’s credential record shall be logged with the identity of the person who accessed it, the date, and the stated purpose. Documentation standards for current government agency access does not change under this law. The individual may inspect their own log.
▪ Individuals confirm their preferred federally identification approval process to access the log of activity on their credential when they register for the credential.
▪ Any person whose credential data is accessed outside this list may bring a civil action against the individual and the organization responsible, and recover damages, costs, and fees specific to the actual costs they incurred.
Section 10 - Consequences.
The federal government shall establish consequences for the following three offenses. We recommend the following principles and do not specify penalties when this law is broken:
▪ An individual who knowingly obtains or holds more than one identity record, or who obtains a credential by fraud.
▪ A private entity or individual who accesses another person’s credential data outside the list in Section 9.
▪ A government entity or employee who accesses another person’s credential data outside the list in Section 9.
A person who has simply let a credential lapse has not committed an offense under this section unless the credential has been expired for more than ninety days.
The government body issuing the credential will notify the individual ninety, sixty, forty-five, thirty, fifteen, and five days before expiration, and at one, fifteen, thirty, forty-five, sixty, and ninety days after expiration of their need to renew. For expediency and to limit cost, these notifications should be via email or text, but postal mail can be an option.
Section 11 - Law Enforcement Use.
Confirming identity is part of law enforcement work, and this credential exists in part to increase the accuracy of that process. This law does not restrict an officer from confirming a person’s identity against the credential where the officer has authority to do so.
Section 12 - Proof It Works.
Each month, the implementing agency shall publish aggregate information online, against the objectives stated in Section 2:
▪ Number of active credentials without categorization of sex, location, etc.
▪ Credentials issued, by category, and the number issued at no charge.
▪ Applications denied, and reason.
▪ Number of individuals with duplicate credentials identified, the number duplicate identity records eliminated, and cause of duplicate credentials - categorized by the cause: Individual’s error, administrative error, or criminal - and resolution status.
▪ Violations of Section 9 identified, and their disposition.
The report is a standard query against the agency’s own records and shall not require a separate study. Where a stated objective is not being met, the report shall say so plainly.
Section 13 - Who Implements, What, and When.
Each government does the work it already does.
▪ The State Department confirms citizenship. It makes this determination every time it issues a passport and already holds the record for roughly half of American adults.[N-000136] States do not make citizenship decisions.
▪ The Department of Homeland Security sets the credential standard, certifies participating states, confirms lawful status for non-citizens, and operates the shared biometric record.[A-000140]
▪ A participating state’s motor-vehicle offices collect the documents and the biometrics, transmit them for verification, and issue the credential once it clears. They gather; they do not decide.
▪ Where a state declines to participate, the Department of Homeland Security shall establish a federal enrollment channel serving that state’s residents. No state is compelled and no resident is excluded.
The credential builds on the Enhanced Driver’s License program already active in five states and on the REAL ID standard met by every state.
Enrollment shall be completed within five years of enactment. The enacting body should expect that schedule to be demanding: The current federal standard was enacted in 2005 and did not reach enforcement until 2025.[N-000094] Roughly half of adults already hold a passport, so their citizenship is confirmed by records check rather than new adjudication.[N-000136] All of them still require biometric enrollment, because United States passports record no fingerprints.[N-000135]
Credentials renew every eight years, matching the current federal standard. Fingerprints and iris images are recollected at each renewal.
A National Identity Service Corps shall be established for the five-year enrollment period, federally funded, drawing on the National Guard, active and retired military, and others who wish to serve, trained and assigned to supplement state and federal enrollment offices. The agencies that would otherwise carry this work are already at capacity.[D-000133, D-000134] This country has organized an effort of this size before: More than three million men served in the Civilian Conservation Corps between 1933 and 1942, with the Department of Labor recruiting, the Army running camps, and each state enrolling under a population quota.[A-000129, A-000130]
Section 14 - Laws This One Replaces.
The enacting body shall list the laws and administrative rules that become unnecessary when this law passes, and repeal them.
Section 15 - If a Court Strikes Part.
If any part of this law is held invalid, the rest remains in effect - except Section 9. If Section 9 is struck in whole or in substantial part, this law shall not take effect. The limits are the condition on which the requirement rests.
V. Status
In public discussion. (August 2026)