Exactly. Even if he makes it past the airport, he can easily have the money taken by police on the drive home via Civil Asset Forfeiture laws. Police say they only need reasonable suspicion that the property is proceeds of criminal activity -- and they can easily say that carrying $45k in cash is enough justification to "suspect" it's either money laundering or drug proceeds. Wa-la, the money is gone. Google "texas highway robbery" or "policing for profit" for an idea on how police are operating in this manner.

Last week a buddy of mine moved from Vegas to Atlanta driving his car full of housewares and a couple of dogs across the country. He mentioned to me that he closed out his local credit union account and was going to taking the cash - approx $10k - with him. I warned him that he had a high probability of having the money stolen by cops and convinced him to draw up a bank check instead. Fortunately, he did. As predicted, he was pulled over without cause by troopers parked at a state line looking for vehicles with out-of-state plates. Long story short: They searched him, placed him in the back of their car and conducted a interview to determine if he was carrying cash or drugs. Most of the questions were bizarre and random simply to gauge his reactions -- basically BDO play. They cut him free after 15 minutes realizing he wasn't a big catch. If he had his cash with him it would be gone now.