Passport Fees Waived for Deployed Search and Rescue Team Members

The Department of State has waived passport fees for members of U.S. search and rescue teams deployed internationally under federal disaster relief agreements.

“This change honors the critical work of American first responders who answer the call to assist abroad,” Mora Namdar, the State Department’s Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs, wrote in an X post.

The change is part of the First Responders Passport Act and went into effect on April 3, as announced in a public notice by the department.

The rule states that the passport fee would be waived for a person operating under a contract, grant, or cooperative agreement with the United States Government to participate in search, rescue, and other related disaster relief operations within a foreign country following a natural disaster.

All passports submitted under the new rule will be processed by the Special Issuance Agency (SIA).

The First Responders Passport Act was enacted as part of the wide-ranging 2024 National Defense Authorization Act, which was signed into law in December 2023.

The National Defense Authorization Act also ordered the State Department to report to Congress on passport wait times and submit a strategy on how the agency planned to speed up passport processing times for applicants. The act separately urged the State Department to take steps to contact Americans when their passport was a year out from expiring.

Prior to Friday’s announcement, there were other ways for a person to avoid paying a passport fee.

The passport fee is waived if a person is an Officer of the United States, a Peace Corps volunteer, U.S. citizen seamen, a family member visiting graves of deceased members of the Armed Forces, a person returning to the United States for humanitarian reasons or for law enforcement purposes, and employees of the American National Red Cross.

People can replace a passport for free if it was lost or damaged during a disaster.

Passport price can vary depending on how soon a person needs it, according to the State Department’s website.

Application fees for a passport book are $130, but if a person wants it rushed, they must pay an extra $60 for expedited service and $22.05 for one- to three-day delivery.

A routine passport processing time takes four to six weeks, expedited processing takes two to three weeks, and urgent processing requires an appointment and must have international travel within 14 calendar days.