A true story from Utah

The 100% ID law

On January 1, 2026, Utah began requiring every customer, of every age, to have their ID scanned electronically for each alcohol purchase.

The backlash came fast. Restaurants turned away whole tables because one person left their ID at the hotel. Tourists couldn't order a beer without a passport. Retirees got carded for the first time in decades.

When people began asking why age verification was required for people far over 21, the bill's own sponsor said:

"This was never the intent of the bill."Rep. Steve Eliason, Newsweek, March 2026

The bill was actually meant to stop alcohol sales to people a court has barred from buying alcohol. Utah marks their identification with a red NO ALCOHOL SALE banner.

But the scanners the law required only verify age; they don't check for the banner. Staff still have to look at the card, exactly as they did before the bill passed.

That goal isn't written anywhere in the law, which means nobody could check whether the law achieved it.

After the kerfuffle got big enough, the legislature scaled the scanning requirement back.

What's the result?

We ended up with a law that told people to follow a procedure that didn't even address what the bill's sponsor said the goal was.

Humanity has more knowledge, science and technology than any generation before us, and we apply it to hard problems everywhere else. Very little of it reaches the way our laws are made. It gets filtered through politics, and it only gets in when a legislator happens to have both the expertise and the clout to write it into a bill.

We think that can change.