The Illinois Secretary of State’s Office has implemented numerous changes in recent years, but two dramatic shifts are on the horizon.
The most noteworthy change is a bill passed by the Illinois General Assembly that would allow the Secretary of State’s Office to issue driver’s licenses that will remain valid for double the current four-year term.
Under the provisions of SB 0275, Illinois motorists will be given the option to receive a driver’s license that would remain valid for eight years, a similar figure to those offered by states like Florida and Georgia.
That change won’t go into effect immediately in 2025, as the General Assembly has mandated that the Secretary of State’s Office formulate rules and policies related to the eight-year license, and to submit those rules by Jan. 1., 2027.
The new licenses would then be offered no later than July 1, 2027, according to officials.
Another significant change will impact Illinois residents sooner than that, with the Secretary of State’s Office having the ability to issue mobile ID cards and driver’s licenses by the end of 2025.
The new policy would allow motorists or residents to download a specialized app that would display their identification cards on a mobile device, with law enforcement and other entities required to accept that type of identification.
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The bill does not require motorists or residents to have the mobile ID cards.
Finally, Illinois and other states will face a soft deadline of May 7, 2025 to require that identification cards be REAL ID-compliant in order to enter federal facilities, or when passing through TSA checkpoints at airports.
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There is still some uncertainty of how strictly that policy will be enforced, as it is possible the TSA will instead implement a warning system to alert passengers whose identification cards aren’t compliant with the legislation.
