TAMPA, Fla. — Both state and federal lawmakers are looking for answers as to what exactly is causing the nation’s passport backlog that’s affecting thousands of Florida residents.

What You Need To Know

  • Residents reportedly waiting months for passport renewals

  • Status updates hard to come by

  • Sen. Rick Scott and Sen. Marco Rubio are pushing state department for answers

Last week, U.S. senators Rick Scott and Marco Rubio were joined by a handful of other lawmakers asking the Biden administration to address the delays. In a letter to U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, they asked what measures the federal government is taking to decrease wait times and resolve the ongoing communication issues. They also asked what permanent solutions would be put into place to avoid a backup of this magnitude from happening again.

St. Pete resident Chad Silver is one of many local residents who was forced to reschedule his vacation. Silver says he needed a passport renewal and paid for expedited service and overnight shipping. The U.S. Department of State’s website shows the turnaround time for such passport renewal requests is seven to nine weeks.

Silver says it has now been roughly 13 weeks and he still hasn’t received his passport.

“The hard part is just not being able to get an answer,” he said. “Just tell me I’m not going to get it.”

As Silver’s trip crept closer, he said he tried everything to get a status update. The online portal on the U.S. Department of State’s website still showed his passport as processing, so he says he called the phone number listed for status checks 31 times before he was able to get someone on the phone.

“She told me maybe you’ll get it, maybe you won’t … and I was like, ‘Can I speak to a supervisor?’” Silver recalled.

Silver bumped his trip to August in hopes he will get his passport in time to go this time around.

U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor says her office has been working with residents like Silver to try and expedite the process.

“We’re triaging cases. So if someone needs a passport and they’re about to leave in the next week we give those priority,” Castor said.

Castor says her best advice is to send in passport applications well in advance, to avoid a panic situation given that the wait time right now is unpredictable.

“It’s just a tidal wave of travel and some updates to their computer processing systems,” she said.

Last year, a test rollout of a new online passport renewal system had numerous kinks and has since been shelved. The state department says that the issue contributed to the delays.