Tipsheet

Here's Why the U.S. Will Soon Start Revoking Some Passports

Amy Curtis
Amy Curtis  |  May 08, 2026 6:15 PM

If you owe back payments in child support, be aware the U.S. may soon revoke your passport. This new policy, slated to begin tomorrow, will first target parents who owe more than $100,000 in child support. But it will soon be expanded to apply those who owe more than $2,500 in back child support payments.

Here's more:

The department told The Associated Press on Thursday that the revocations would begin Friday and be focused on those who owe $100,000 or more. That would apply to about 2,700 American passport holders, according to figures supplied to the State Department by the Department of Health and Human Services.

The revocation program, plans for which were first reported by the AP in February, soon will be greatly expanded to cover parents who owe more than $2,500 in unpaid child support — the threshold set by a little-enforced 1996 law, the State Department said.

It was not clear on Thursday how many passport holders owe more than $2,500 because HHS is still collecting data from state agencies that track the figures, but it could encompass many more thousands of people, officials said.

Will this get parents to make good on the child support they owe? We'll see.

Probably.

The solution to this is to pay your child support on time.

Or they don't care about paying child support and are traveling, instead.

Then pay your bills. Problem solved.

We're sure there will be a legal challenge to this, and we'll see what the courts say when those challenges come.