LessO2

C'mon....seriously?

With health care reform and Iran being front and center, as well as they should be, I doubt this court ruling did anything at the White House.

It probably caused a couple of memos to be distributed at DHS, but the White House and election implications? C'mon.

jkhuggins

Actually, that's hardly unique to TSA; many corporations tend to have a very restrictive view on who can speak publicly on their behalf. The blogosphere is changing some of those rules, to be sure. But there is something to be said for letting TPTB come up with a reasoned response and doing it right the first time (the response, that is).

Nevertheless ... it's nice to know that there isn't a gag on this item at the moment. ^

Boggie Dog

Your suggesting that the White House can't handle more than a couple of issues at any one time, is that it?

When one of the most hated government agencies is front and center in the news and getting some serious attention in congress week after week I think a prudent administration would have someone paying attention to what is going on.

Beats getting blindsided.

Boggie Dog

If no gag order is in effect is there a TSA policy with a lower than $10,000 amount that is considered suspicious if found during screening?

txrus

You're assuming the average run of the mill smurf:

1. Knows about this case

2. Knows where to find the ruling

3. Has read all 8 pages of it

4. Understands what all 8 pages of it means

5. Is then able to connect the dots between what is described on those 8 pages w/what he/she does every day.

Maybe it's just me, but I think that's asking a bit much from your neighborhood smurf...

codex57

I'm sure they're aware of it, just that it's a backburner issue. In daily briefings (you know how his staff distill things into memos a page or two long for him to read in the morning?), this prolly got a paragraph if it even was brought to his attention.

Some underling is prolly monitoring it, but I'm sure no policy is being discussed with the other stuff going on (health care, economy, dropping popularity numbers, train crash, N. Korea, etc.). This isn't exactly urgent stuff.

mikeef

As great as this ruling is, precedent would indicate that the good folks who bring you airport security will find some sort of procedure to circumvent it.

Mike

Boggie Dog

"See, e.g., Hartwell, 436 F.3d at 179 (collecting
cases). In light of recent history, it cannot be seriously
debated that the need for airport security
searches is “particularly acute.” Edmond, 531 U.S. at
47-48."

Seems this judge is questioning the need for this level of inspection in general.

gfunkdave

I read it as the other way around - that "in light of recent history [9/11]" it is taken as a given that "the need for airport security searches is 'particularly acute'".

cparekh

I placed it on my website for download, if anyone is interested.

Boggie Dog

Perhaps I'm not as skilled at interpretation but I read it differently than you.

"In light of recent history, it cannot be seriously
debated that the need for airport security
searches is “particularly acute."

My take is that recent history has no demonstrable attempts of any aviation terrorism and that the scope of current screening methods exceed the current threat.

I liken it to keeping the Alert level at Orange for aviation. There seems little reason to do so other than as a means to instill undue concern in anyone who travels.

I haven't gone back to the referenced materials to understand the judges position. When I have some time I will read the other cites.

I may have it wrong. If so I have no problem admitting it.

IslandBased

^^Excellent thread, and perhaps it is a step in keeping TSA reined in.

"Quite simply the Government failed to produce evidence from which this Court could conclude that the search of Fofana's luggage was "no more extensive or intensive than necessary, in light of current technology, to detect the
presence of weapons or explosives;" or that the search was "confined in good faith to that purpose." 4 Aukai, 497 F.3d at 962. As the Government bears the burden of establishing that a search was constitutional, that failure is outcome
determinative [*22] and the Court must grant Fofana's Motion to Suppress."

ralfp

Meaning serious, but short-term. 9/11 was almost eight years ago. That's no longer 'acute' (maybe the judge is really old and has a different concept of time).

Perhaps judges should eschew imprecise verbiage?

HSVTSO Dean

And TSA is the same, really. But I, here, even with a tag in front of my name that says where I work and what I do (i.e.; "HSVTSO") do not speak officially on behalf of the TSA. It's rather much like standing at the checkpoint and someone comes up to ask me a question, or want to talk about some incident or what-not. Except that it's on a massive scale.

I'm not going to call the Office of Strategic Communications and Public Affairs to answer questions from passengers at the checkpoint, y'know.

There's not. At all.

I'll have more to say about that in a little while; right now I got to run. My wife wants to go out to eat and she's hollarin' from the front door that I better get my butt in motion.

BBL~

bocastephen

I suspect this case will be appealed and the appellate court will reverse because the number of spineless judges far outweighs the number who take the Constitution and preserving individual rights seriously. I believe as a judge moves up the food chain from district court, they continually lose their correct Constitutional grounding and just become twitterheads for the State.

I also suspect that no policy changes will occur at TSA - in fact, they will specifically claim business as usual and wait for others to challenge the finding of non-germane items in court until things go their way.

I will give a big thumbs up to this one judge - at least one person on the bench sees things our way.

Based on the few email interactions I've had with Team Obushama, the WH has absolutely nothing in store for the TSA except pushing its unionization agenda. In fact, absolutely nothing that occurs at the airport with the TSA even registers with the WH. Don't expect any changes to come - their choice of DHS secretary is an obvious clue. If they had 'change we can believe in' on the agenda, DHS would be dismantled as we speak.