By: Kloe Adams
Games Creator
Beginning in December, the Selective Service System (SSS) will automatically register eligible young men for the military draft pool. This measure is a part of the National Defense Authorization Act, which the House and the Senate passed and President Donald Trump signed into law on Dec. 18, 2025, for the 2026 fiscal year. The SSS already requires men aged 18 to 26 to register for the selective service in case a draft is required. According to SSS’s 2024 report, automatic registration is already in place in 26 states and territories. In late March, SSS proposed a rule to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs to implement the practice nationwide.
Mandatory registration applies to green-card holders, refugees, asylum seekers, and undocumented men. Those on non-immigrant visas are exempt. In states that have not enacted automatic registration, men must register within 30 days of their 18th birthday. It is a felony not to register for the selective service, and avoidance can result in the loss of certain benefits, such as access to student and government loans as well as to federal jobs. Moreover, violating the Military Selective Service Act could lead to imprisonment for up to five years and a fine of up to 250,000 dollars.
SSS is an executive branch agency that is separate from the Defense Department. Since 1980, SSS has required men ages 18 to 25 who are eligible to register for the selective service. The last time Congress instated a draft was during February of 1973 during the Vietnam War. Congress would have to approve a draft before one took place. Additionally, not all registered men would be enlisted; there is a lottery in which men’s birthdays and numbers are randomly chosen. The SSS would induct people whose 20th birthdays fall in the year of the draft first, followed by the following age groups: 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 19, and those who are more than six months past their 18th birthday. Selected men would be allowed to request exemption or deferment; remaining men would then go through “physical, mental, and moral evaluation” according to the SSS. Democratic Representative Chrissy Houlahan, who sponsored the automatic selective service, announced: “Making registration automatic, not only saves taxpayer dollars by eliminating the need to advertise but finally ensures that young men are not unknowingly penalized.”
The Trump administration noted that automatic registration has no connection to the ongoing war with Iran; however, they have declined to rule out the possibility of putting U.S. troops on the ground. Jeremy Kessler, a professor at Columbia Law School who has written extensively on the draft, believes that ground invasion would not be logistically doable without resorting to the draft.
(Sources: CNN, NY Times)