Michigan License Plates that Recognize Military Service

LANSING, Mich. – In honor of the upcoming Veterans Day holiday, Secretary of State Ruth Johnson reminds veterans that Michigan offers more than two dozen veteran license plates recognizing their service protecting the freedoms Americans hold dear.

“Michigan is proud to be home to hundreds of thousands of courageous veterans who have served in our nation’s armed forces and who deserve our utmost respect and admiration,” Johnson said. “One of the ways our state honors veterans is by offering special license plates that commemorate their service and remind the rest of us of their heroism.”

Each of the designations is available to qualifying veterans either on the white standard Pure Michigan license plate or the colorful Spectacular Peninsulas plate. Veterans can order their plate at any Secretary of State office or through the mail by downloading an application at Michigan.gov/sos and mailing it in. They can also see what their plate will look like before they order it by using the Plate It Your Way service at ExpressSOS.com.

Most plates are also available to the spouses of veterans for their vehicles. One plate, the Gold Star Family Plate, is available to immediate family members of military personnel who lost their lives in combat.

Six of the military service plates also are offered as motorcycle plates: Air Force Veteran, Army Veteran, Coast Guard Veteran, Marine Corps Veteran, National Guard Veteran and Navy Veteran.

Three plates feature logos of medals and are available to men and women who earned the Afghanistan Campaign Medal, the Iraq Campaign Medal or the Vietnam Service Medal and their spouses.

Michigan also offers a Veterans Memorial fundraising plate, which has a military dog tags logo and the words “Lest We Forget” at the bottom of the plate. The plate benefits the Vietnam Veterans Memorial monument in Lansing. Johnson supports legislation that would create a fundraising license plate to benefit veteran outreach and tuition-assistance programs.

Johnson has unveiled a number of initiatives in support of the 680,000 veterans who call Michigan home:

Creating a veteran designation on driver’s licenses and state ID cards that helps identify Michigan veterans so they can be connected with the benefits they have earned and deserved. To date, more than 200,000 veterans have applied.
Pushing new ways to ensure that military personnel have their votes counted on Election Day, such as successfully advocating to extend a federal write-in ballot to state and local races.
Waiving road tests for veterans applying for a Commercial Driver License to help their transition to civilian life if they have sufficient heavy truck experience in the military.
Offering more than two dozen military license plates that are available for veterans and their spouses, allowing them to display their service with pride.

Veteran/military service plates are available with the following designations (Most plates are also available to the spouses of veterans for their vehicles except where indicated by an asterisk):