TSA backtracks on private screeners amid lawsuits

It’s not hard to image how much louder the public outcry would have been during the pat-down controversy last year if the Transportation Security Administration had also shut down it Screening Partnership Program, which allowed airports to privatize their security.

After all, private screeners were seen as a loophole to avoid increasingly aggressive federal transportation security officers. Several airports were reportedly considering “firing” their TSA screeners after the new body-scanners began appearing, accompanied by more intrusive physical searches.

In short, the program was an escape valve through which the traveling public let out a steam of rage. Had it not been there, who knows what would have happened?

But here’s more evidence that the federal agency charged with protecting our transportation systems understands the importance of timing. It waited until yesterday — two months after the enhanced-screening media circus — to freeze the program. I wonder how long they’ve been meaning to do that.

So what does that mean to us?

At some point, the TSA will probably require the privatized airports — including San Francisco International Airport and Kansas City International Airport — to revert back to federal screeners, even though many frequent travelers to Screening Partnership Program airports say they’ve experienced significantly better service and less intrusive and abusive searches.

Meanwhile, the TSA’s troubles have gone from bad to worse.

A Transit Police Department officer was suspended on Thursday for 10 days without pay after he admitted keeping more than 1,000 items that TSA agents confiscated at Buffalo Niagara International Airport over several years, according to a report in the Buffalo News.

It’s a silly story that got far more traction than it deserved, but it begs a more serious question: If these confiscated items were so dangerous, why weren’t they destroyed?

Earlier this month, Jesse Ventura, the former governor of Minnesota and professional wrestler, filed a lawsuit against the agency and Department of Homeland Security, accusing the TSA of violating Ventura’s “rights under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.”

The “Body” doesn’t want anyone touching his body. Look up “irony” in the dictionary.

Then there’s the case of Phil Mocek, a Seattle software developer arrested last year for refusing to show ID to TSA agents. He was acquitted earlier this month by an Albuquerque jury. You can see the cell phone recording of his arrest at the top of this post. It is deeply troubling and shows an abusive federal agency that is unaware of its own rules.

The TSA spin machine shifted into high gear after the stunning loss, insisting Mocek had “appeared to be trying to film sensitive security information related to TSA standard operating procedures on ID verification.” Which is, of course, complete nonsense.

Oh yeah, and that airport bombing in Russia? Turns out the TSA wouldn’t have been able to stop a similar attack in the States.

Here’s the bottom line: The TSA is the laughingstock of the aviation world. Its public image is worse than the rent-a-cops it replaced in 2002. We’re at the point where the only practical solution is to push the “reboot” button. Nothing less than a complete overhaul of the agency and its practices will fix this mess.

  • http://www.facebook.com/pages/Boycott-Flying/126801010710392 Mark

    Dangerous naked scanners or sexual assault/molestation? Don’t put up with this unconstitutional garbage! Boycott Flying ENTIRELY until sanity returns! Please join us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Boycott-Flying/126801010710392

  • http://www.advicegoddess.com Amy Alkon

    The “Body” doesn’t want anyone touching his body. Look up “irony” in the dictionary.

    Low blow.

    Nor do I. I was sexually assaulted as a condition of flying at the Vegas airport. I had a ticket I’d paid for to San Francisco, and another ticket from SF home to LA, and an already-paid-for SF hotel room at a newspaper conference I had to be at. This was before the recent TSA stuff (last January) and I’m still disturbed by it, and I’m no priss, but an advice columnist who gets letters about people’s weird sexual issues, among other things.

    Flying has become a normal way of getting around in this country and the government doesn’t get to make (useless and unreasonable) searches, sans probable cause, a prerequisite. What’s my boyfriend’s choice? (He flies to Detroit from LA every two weeks for his work.) Does he hitchhike or take a Greyhound for two days?

    If anyone with a reading level that’s adequate to understand your column, Chris, wanted to sneak something onto a plane to blow it up, they could. They might have to have partners, but they could manage to get a combo of things on.

  • Kevin

    As I was reading this post…I kept thinking to myself “when did Chris start allowing other people to post articles on his site?” Then as I continued reading, I became aware that it was actually Chris…just a really frustrated Chris. You know this is a huge problem for all of us when Chris writes such a frustrated post such as this….however, well done, in your typical diplomatic demeanor, sir!

    It is truly a shame that things have come down to this. That magical thing known as flying has disappeared. Yes, it isnt as glamorous as it used to be…but still, it’s a magical thing that we all enjoy. Security has made it terribly worse.

    I’ve traveled by train and car to avoid all the headaches and frustrations of airport security in the past year. I haven’t flown ONCE. And I can’t say I miss it. The removing of shoes, belts, emptying pockets, having to open carry-ons, place toiletries in a separate container is an absolute joke. It’s a circus act everyone has to go through to just travel for business or leisure. It takes the fun out of traveling, flying, and getting away from home. I’ve had so many items taken from me that were not supposed to be confiscated. But you can never win with the authorities – especially if you have a plane to catch for important meetings.

    It’s not only our rights being taken away, but our dignity as well. Being shuffled into security lanes, being treated as terrorists by going through scanners or intrusive pat-downs, going through the circus act of removing every imaginable object. It’s embarrassing that this is how we treat other people. It’s even more embarrassing to the world when they travel through our country. We’re really that paranoid? give me a break. Our government is doing everything possible and imaginable to find out more about us and to put us into a state of fear.

    I feel bad for the TSA agents. They know they go to work expecting to feel the hatred of passengers, and knowing they’re going to aggravate someone. It’s their job. They need the job to support themselves and their families. A lot of them are really nice people, then there are the not so nice ones – like in all professions. A lot of them have sipped the cool-aid though. Flying through BWI once, I was wearing a cross necklace that was given to me by a priest of mine. It meant the world to me. I had forgotten to take it off, and it was heavy enough that it set off the metal detector. I took it off and put it through the scanner with my other possessions. As it came through, one of the TSA agents snatched it up and started to investigate it as a weapon. It was less than an inch long, clearly a religious symbol, and not sharp or dangerous in any capacity. They wanted to confiscate it…I demanded to speak to a supervisor immediately. After much explaining, pleading, then begging I was given back my cross. I was so humiliated. One that I reached the point of begging for it back, but also because it was so humiliating that I had to go through the ordeal of them having absolutely no common sense or respect for me.

    I refuse to fly, I will fly soon to keep my air miles from expiring but that is it. I cannot stand the terrible ordeal that flying has become. We’re cattle at a slaughtering house essentially.

    I hope people like Chris, national media, and citizens that are outraged will forego flying when possible, and write to people in charge about problems they have had while going through the security process so that way more attention can be brought to this monstrosity known as airport security.

  • Christopher Elliott

    @Amy, no insult was intended. The suit itself is solid, alleging that the government is violating Ventura’s Fourth Amendment rights. He doesn’t want any money.

    I have to make a similar decision whenever I fly: scan or pat-down. I abhor both choices. Making that decision for my children is even more difficult. Yes, I’m frustrated, Kevin. There has to be a better way.

  • Thomas

    @ Mark All though I agree with your idea in principal, that
    won’t work for me. I agree that TSA has to be completely dismantled
    and put back together. The only problem is how and what will it
    look like. The agency is run by a government that believes they
    have the answers to everything. Look at the BP spill, they put the
    Coast Guard in charge. How much experience does the CG have with
    oil spills? NONE! Look at our airports and security. I agree with
    Chris, TSA would not have stopped a similar bombing such as Moscow.
    I’ve stated on this forum before how foriegn airports require
    screening before entering the main airport lobby. How hard would it
    be to walk into ANY major airport in the US with a bomb in a
    suitcase and detonate it BEFORE security? Throwing dollars at the
    situation is not working. Start with a plan and follow through. A
    terrorist is going to look at the security situation and find a way
    around it. Right now, that would be our borders.

  • Datanerd

    Chris, be careful what you wish for. I work in a federal
    building (no national security implications here) with private
    security that screens all employees with x-ray machines and
    magnetometers. These guys are worse than TSA when it comes to
    treating people respectfully and with dignity. Seriously, why would
    employees from a private firm making $7.50 an hour treat travelers
    better than federal employees making $15-20 an hour. They’re going
    to be lower skilled, lower quality, and less capable. The problem
    isn’t the TSA per se, it’s the procedures that the administrators
    have put in place. The choice of the nude-o-scope or the enhanced
    freedom grope is a choice of invasive or invasive. Instead, we need
    to get the nude-o-scope safer (more research), less invasive (no
    real body images), and less annoying (Not having to remove shoes,
    belts, or outer wear). That would be a tradeoff worth
    making.

  • WestCoastMillionMiler

    Chris: Ironically, I had a taste of the “privatized
    service” on one of my two flights out of SFO this past week. Let me
    tell you, I would perfer TSA! How could TSA spend 100s of millions
    for technology that is less able to detect threats than what it
    replaced? Why should a “privatized agent” tell me that she does not
    work for TSA, so she can require stricter standards than what TSA
    has? Bottom line, I do not have a problem with using the new
    scanners–but they have to be an improvement over the old ones. So
    far, they are neither an improvement nor do they speed up the
    process. Add insult to injury, individual private employees can
    choose to be “stricter than TSA, because I am private” allows
    someone to attempt to embarass, etc. anyone they appear to not
    like!

  • BucksterSF

    I love how Jesse and others feel it’s somehow a right to
    fly. I’d be willing to bet while he was in office many of his
    responses started “Well if you don’t want to ….” The last time I
    checked airlines were private companies and flying was not
    mandatory.

  • cjr

    Un-effing-believable. No, wait, this is TSA we’re talking
    about. “These guys are worse than TSA when it comes to treating
    people respectfully and with dignity.” And yet, NONE of these
    stories regarding airport security are coming from those airports
    which have private companies handling security, rather than TSA. I
    think you’ve got it completely wrong, as TSA’s agents have proven
    time and again that they have no training, no skills, and are
    utterly incompetent.

  • Sommer Gentry

    Remember Egypt and Tunisia. The people in fact hold all the
    power, if we would just wield it constructively. The TSA will lose.
    They will stop creating pornographic pictures of us, molesting our
    children, and stealing our belongings on the very day we stand up
    together against these criminal perverts. Have the rest of you
    abandoned your rights and your humanity, your respect for your own
    bodies, for this lie of “security” that TSA can’t give you? Fight!
    I’m ready to march in the streets over this. I’m ready to chain
    myself to that irradiating porn machine and be a human shield to
    protect rape survivors from being revictimized and dragged through
    the Austin airport. Who’s with me? My body is mine. No TSA thug is
    going to fondle my vagina or ogle my body through my clothes.
    Fight! I’m still writing letters, calling my Congressional
    representatives, compaining to airlines and hotels, riding Amtrak.
    Yesterday I got a letter back from the Department of Transportation
    about my complaints, and I succeeded in getting a refund from
    Southwest Airlines for an expensive ticket that I couldn’t use.
    Fight! Any way we can think of, fight!

  • Carl

    Is there a link between Pistole’s pronouncement that
    airports can no longer opt out of the TSA and the coming vote on
    unionization of the TSA? Wasn’t it a condition of Congress’s
    approval process of Pistole that he permit unionization of the TSA?
    I don’t see how unionization and banning airport opt-out will
    either improve aviation security, or customer service.

  • cjr

    “I love how Jesse and others feel it’s somehow a right to
    fly.” . Because there’s rights, law, and precedent that guarantees
    it, perhaps?

  • Barbara

    It’s federally authorized Gate Rape, plain and
    simple.

  • http://twitter.com/pmocek Phil Mocek

    More detail about the trial, including photos and a
    nearly-full audio archive along with a PayPal link and postal mail
    address for donations to my legal defense fund (I’m paying
    out-of-pocket for my criminal defense and owe thousands), can be
    found at http://papersplease.org/wp/mocek . Video the state
    presented as evidence against me (plus subtitles I added) — that
    which I recorded prior to and during my arrest — is at
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pc5DBUK1K8M .

  • frostysnowman

    I, for one, am so, so tired of hearing people try to justify the new TSA scanners and pat-downs by saying “flying is not a right.” I have a right to unreasonable search first and foremost.

  • Thomas

    @ frostysnowman

    I agree! What’s next, stops on the freeway, checks before entering a mall?

    Be prepared for a comment from BucksterSF

  • http://www.advicegoddess.com Amy Alkon

    @Amy, no insult was intended. The suit itself is solid, alleging that the government is violating Ventura’s Fourth Amendment rights. He doesn’t want any money.

    I’m with him. I guess I just misunderstood the irony remark. I am so irate about these searches, I guess I can’t quite read through my rage.

    I’m so sorry, Chris, that you have kids that have to go through this as well. If I am touched again, I will file sexual assault charges up on my return if I can. I encourage others to do that and lawyers who know about this to weigh in on it. If I see a constitutional scholar at a dinner I’m going to next week, I’ll ask him about it, and try to remember to come back here and comment.

  • http://nmdfreelance.com Nancy

    I think what rankles me the most in all of this is that we are expected to accept it, no questions asked.

    If someone is at the airport going through security, we’re on our way to a destination “somewhere else”. Given we have a limited amount of time to get to our gate, we have no choice but to comply with either the porn-o-scan or “gate rape” to get there. If we remotely raise our concerns at the airport, we will find ourselves subjected to more abuse, probably missing our flight.

    TSA has us over a barrel and they know it. They also take advantage of it as has been evidenced by numerous videos taken by the airport security cameras as well as cell phones.

    A mother doesn’t want her breast milk x-rayed? She misses her flight. A man doesn’t want someone to “touch his junk” and he is asked to leave the airport.

    This is all government sanctioned molestation and they take advantage of the power they wield to bully us all into submission.

    When Obama compared himself to Abraham Lincoln I knew we were in for trouble. Habeas Corpus was a joke to Old Abe and it’s a joke to Obama.

  • Heather

    I agree with those saying that flying is not a right and that as long as I follow a set of rules regarding flying I can do so, but there’s a problem with that as well. The rules are not exactly legal. They currently conflict with rights we are guaranteed by law and they supersede those rules. In border searches there are legal precedents in place that say yes you can be searched without a warrant and without cause under a 4th amendment exception, but even if you apply that to the TSA they still are not following them correctly. You must have reasonable suspicion to conduct non-routine searches like the pat-downs and the scans. Reasonable suspicion is not probable cause, but it is more than just a suspicion or a hunch and has to be based “specific and articulable facts”.
    I am basing this off of the cases:
    United States v. Flores-Montano, United States v. Montoya De Hernandez, and Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968)

  • Scott

    @ Nancy:

    Blaming Obama for the bureaucracy that was created by Bush? Typical. Don’t have to guess what side of the political aisle you are on. LOL

  • Mike Z

    @Scott We elected the person/people we have now because of promises to fix the problems, not make them worse.

    Instead of repealing much of the Patriot Act, which abuses the Constitution and violates our rights, we get even more. When the Wikileaks stuff first came out, most people in America were outraged that someone would post harmful information. However, as more and more is known, I am thinking most of that crap shouldn’t have even been classified to begin with. I also think that it is the job of a journalist or reporter to publish stuff like this as it is a guaranteed freedom we have in America. I also think that much of our press has started ignoring digging into political wrongdoing and instead focusing more on the sensationalism we call Hollywood. The press in america is losing its way.

  • Lisa S

    Thank you, Chris, for keeping this topic in the forefront. These unreasonable searches have to be stopped.

  • cjr

    http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/02/01/travel-us-airport-security-las-vegas_8285479.html

    This isn’t filling me with confidence either, seeing how short it is on details.

  • http://www.cogitamusblog.com/ Lisa Simeone

    Sommer Gentry, I’m with you. I, too, have been writing and speaking out relentlessly about this topic. I’ve also stopped flying. I adore travel, and am grateful that I’ve already done so much of it in my life, but no more. Not until these abusive procedures stop.

    I also refuse to fly for business anymore and have told my employers that. I’m taking a 10-1/2-hour train ride later this week, in fact, for a business trip, rather than a one-hour flight, because I refuse to be molested.

    YES, I KNOW THAT NOT EVERYONE HAS THIS LUXURY; some people must fly for work. But for those of us who can make the choice, we should. I’m giving up travel abroad, a sacrifice for me, but I’m willing to do it. As Sommer says, we have to put our money where our mouths are; otherwise nothing will change. Make the airlines feel it. Make your elected officials feel it. Don’t let up. If we don’t put a stop to this now, these assaults will be implemented at ALL transportation hubs, not just airports. (Sommer, you and I both live in the Balto/DC area; I’ve seen your comments on the MoCo blog as well, in regard to the new, abusive searches on the DC Metro.)

    My friends think I’m crazy, but they’re the ones who are deluded. They are the proverbial frog in the slowly boiling pot. At least some of us have the guts to stand up for what’s right. And those naysayers who keep yammering about “privilege” versus “right” don’t understand the legal concept of rights. Hello — it’s also a “privilege” to be able to walk down the street without getting murdered, because in many places around the world people don’t have that luxury; that doesn’t mean that therefore you don’t have the “right” to walk down the street. Learn some basic constitutional law, people. The 4th Amendment exists for you no matter where you are — in your home, in your car, on a train, and at the airport. It’s not something the government gives you; it’s something you own — at all times — and that can’t be taken away, unless you let it.

    As for private vs. public, I think it’s a lot of nonsense. I don’t believe that private security firms are going to be any less abusive. And we’re paying BILLIONS for DHS. Shouldn’t we bet getting something for our money? Besides waste and abuse??

  • DFW Road Warrior

    There are two elements to the TSA. One is the equipment that for the most part we have no control over. The second is people and that we do have some element of control. You get back what you give. I’m not going to say that I have not experienced a rude TSA officer, I have, but not often. My experience is to approach the screening area in a positive, respectful, and friendly demeanor. It’s not easy to be abusive when someone is smiling and speaking to you in a positive manner. I suspect the majority of TSA employees are not in agreement with the agency’s policies just as many employees don’t agree with everything their company’s do but they come to work and carry them out because like many they need the job and so they try and make the best of it. It’s a lot easier to do a job when you have the customer’s cooperation instead of fighting you every step of the way.

    You have a lot more control than you realize as to whether the trip through security is a nightmare or a pleasant experience.

  • http://www.cogitamusblog.com/ Lisa Simeone

    DFW Road Warrior writes:
    “My experience is to approach the screening area in a positive, respectful, and friendly demeanor. It’s not easy to be abusive when someone is smiling and speaking to you in a positive manner.”

    If I had a dime for every time I’ve heard someone say that, I’d be rich. Yes, folks, we know this. We know this. Many millions of us conduct our lives this way all the time — with courtesy, with civility, with compassion, with tolerance. And we’ve still gotten screwed.

    I’m sorry, but this “solution” is naive and simplistic. How courteous and civil do we have to be with someone’s hands down our pants?? It’s just nonsense to suggest that if only we passengers were more cooperative, we wouldn’t get abused by some power-tripping functionary.

  • Jesse

    @BucksterSF
    The airline companies may be private but the searches are not being conducted or mandated by the airplane companies. While the Bill of Rights does not protect you against private parties searching you etc. it does “protect” you against government searches. Is TSA a branch of the government?

    I wonder if Phil Mocek would be able to sue Albuquerque Police Department on basis of wrong imprisonment because as it looks like he was not causing trouble in order to be arrested.