License rules hurt some legal residents

WASHINGTON, Oct. 16 (UPI) -- Tighter driver's license restrictions adopted by some U.S. states to target illegal immigrants have inadvertently affected some legal residents.

Patrick Fernan, deputy director of the Wisconsin motor vehicles department, said people including an 82-year-old World War II refugee from Poland and Laotians who fled to the United States after the Vietnam War have had difficulty proving their legal status to obtain driver's licenses in the state, Stateline.org reported Tuesday.

Meanwhile, some Georgia women said their licenses were revoked after they took their husbands' last names because their names no longer matched their Social Security numbers.

The tougher license regulations follow the Real ID Act passed by Congress in 2005, which requires states to begin checking the identities of license-holders starting May 2008.

The new Real ID regulations were described as voluntary by the Department of Homeland Security but people holding licenses from states that don't comply with the law won't be able to use the cards as valid ID for boarding airplanes or entering federal buildings.