If one researches online further beyond the government website, then one will learn they’re only doing the job at hand by the law on the books, starting with the 2,700 who owe $100k or more in back child support and will work down to those who owe $2,500.

The USG is doing this with the states in the name of the children who depend on the child support and holding the parents accountable to their support agreements. Nothing wrong with that. The totals of unpaid back child support goes into the hundreds of millions of dollars. Even those who still have an active passport and are deadbeat but are aware of this new enforcement have returned to paying child support as they should. Once the child support agreement is fulfilled for those who had the passport revoked, they’ll get their passport back to travel. There’s nothing nefarious about this by the USG. It wouldn’t surprise me, IMO, if the states or someone within the states asked for this help after exhausting all other measures to get back child support from someone who has a passport (which is the key marker here since not all deadbeats have passports).

If having a bigger stick enforcing the payment plan by revoking (or threatening to revoke) a passport helps the state collect back child support for the child, then great. This is not about finding other ways to screw the American citizen once low hanging fruit against PFRs is exhausted (as noted in the original post).

One source for your reading leisure on this: The U.S. Is Now Revoking Passports Over Unpaid Child Support (8 May 2026 Travel Pirates) (https://www.travelpirates.com/captains-log/us-passport-revocation-child-support). There are other articles detailing this effort as well. Deadbeats need to pay up, it is past time.

As to the passport issue, according to the US State Department, HHS will now inform the State Department of all past-due payments of more than $2,500 and parents in that group will have their passports revoked. The first 2,700 revocations are now being conducted. Previously, the revocation policy only applied to those who attempted to renew their passports. There was never a pro-active enforcement action as there is now. The law is not new (and I never said it was), however the method and means by which it is being enforced is new.

The 1996 law that allows the federal government to revoke passports for unpaid child support is the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA), also known as the Welfare Reform Act (P.L. 104-193). It started at $5K and was lowered to $2.5K in 2005 via the Deficit Reduction Act. Prevents overseas flight risks of those who still owe. Given the passport is a govt doc, it is within their right to revoke as they see fit.

Sounds ominous, doesn’t it? The revoking of passports for unpaid back child support as an example is not new and been on the books for the thirty years already. It prevents those with debt such as this and others from being an overseas flight risk to avoid payment. Prevent fearmongering, research the actions being enforced today to see how old they are.

Mark

They keep saying “over and over again” that the registry is not punishment. If my dad when I was a kid had my toy taken away, I was being punished. How is taking people’s pensions not punishment. Even if it didn’t pass, just the concept of that is punishing someone for something that they did decades ago. And if they would pass it, retro-actively punishing you.

If they could get away with it, they would send us all back to prison for life. (And probably saying that is not punishment either. They would make up something like a “Safety protocol”.

However, it strikes me that there is something much more sinister afoot in the USA than just this proposed legislation. There is ample evidence that the US Government is actively targeting multiple groups of citizens for enhanced enforcement and harassment. Legislation targeting those forced to register is the low hanging fruit. This particularly odious piece of legislation is just the most recent example. But what happens when the low hanging fruit has been picked?

This happens. This week, the State Department said it was in the process of revoking or denying US Passports for citizens who owe more than $2500 in back child support. Some 2,700 people are targeted in the first round. The IRS is doing the same for people who are in arrears with their tax debt with no payment plan. The Justice Department announced it was denaturalizing US Citizens for certain crimes.

So you see, it isn’t just persons forced to register that are being targeted. That is why it’s so important for us, along with our friends and family, to speak out against this legislation at the appropriate time and to support FAC in whatever way we can. How many of us would have heard about the legislation if not for FAC?

I don’t know what the motive is here, I don’t know why it is happening all at once and I don’t know where this all ends. But history has shown us what lies at the ends of these roads, and it is never a good thing.

@Quiet

AMEN! And very well stated. Thank you.