Any Experiences With TSA Harassment During the Super Bowl?
 

I found this article on the TSA website:

I'm curious if anyone was harassed either around the stadium area, an airport, or somewhere else in the Bay Area last week?

Notice that SPOTNiks are now called "behavior detection and analysis officers".

I'm curious what happens when a Spotnik, er, BDAO, targets a pax who does not speak English.

How does the BDAO who has targeted a woman for yawning and sweating (middle-aged woman 'hot flash' clear her if there's a language barrier?

Never mind, I know the answer. We're all 'guilty' until the checkpoint temporarily clears us, so in this case, the innocent woman would probably get the back room treatment because the BDAO can't tell the difference between a hot flash and nervous terrorist sweat without interrogating the woman.

Looking back now, I wonder what have transpired if I didn't speak English when I got targeted by a BDO/spotnik who actually followed me into the airport bathroom and continued interrogating me while I was in a stall tending to business.

I've filed this mental picture away for the day that it happens to me. I'm thinking I would, in the middle of the activity, to turn towards him and ask him to repeat his question. On the SPOTNik checklist, I didn't see any points awarded for "being urinated upon by a passenger".

No issues at security but immigration & customs at LAX was the slowest I've experienced entering USA in years the other day. 90 minutes despite maybe 1 minute of questions by the officer - the rest was queuing time.

Is TSA expanding the BDO program in general? I have encountered rather aggressive BDOs on my last two trips through a TSA checkpoint. "Where are you going? How long will you be gone? Is this a work trip? Are you traveling alone? Did you pack your own bags? What do you think of the weather today?"

FWIW, I asked the first BDO why it mattered if I answered or not. He demanded that I answer. I told his supervisor later that I did not like TSA employees demanding answers to irrelevant questions and my travel details did not need to be announced in front of everybody else at the checkpoint; she confirmed that he was a BDO and said she'd talk to him. I asked the second BDO if he was a BDO. He said, "I might be. You know about the BDO program?" Then he asked me what I thought about the BDO program. I wasn't sure how to answer that at first, but I eventually said I'd read the GAO report. He acknowledged the existence of that report but did not otherwise comment on it. Another TSA employee at the same checkpoint later started asking me more questions. "What's your job?" Etc. He kept asking until I asked him if he was a BDO, too.

Sorry for the ramble or if this has been discussed elsewhere in the past few months! I've not been here in a long while, and I suspect there's a lot of TSA news I need to catch up on.

First & foremost, THANK YOU for pushing back against this unconstitutional crap. Out of curiosity, do you have any gut feeling why they singled you out for interrogation? Do you think you might fit a certain demographic? Or, were they interrogating everyone and you were the only one who pushed back?

You weren't whistling, per chance??? :D

They were questioning everybody, and I'm the only one who objected. :(

I work near the Super Bowl Village that was set up in downtown San Francisco. TSA presence unobtrusive, just saw one TSA jacket at the BART station using up oxygen and doing nothing in particular. Some ATF agents with dogs roaming around, lots of SWAT teams patrolling out in glorified golf carts from the Fed building. Those actually concerned me most, were the SWATs: all that young testosterone with AR-15s. If anything went down, I would not want to be anywhere near those guys.

Where exactly were the TSO located? What modes of transport were they "securing"? I can think of airports, already mentioned, BART, Caltrain, Light rail (Mountain View to San Jose). :confused:

I am totally terrified my "strange " dogs. They get close to me and I back of . Start having "attacks". That makes me a terroist? Weird.

:confused:

I understood the first part (reaction to strange dogs) but yeah, I wasn't able to make the jump to "makes me a terrorist" either.

I think the point is that there are lists of 'suspicious behaviors'. Some idiots assume that exhibiting these behaviors at the airport (whistling, yawning, talking too much, not talking, etc.), is clear evidence that you must be guilty of something and since we're at an airport, you must be a terrorist.

Fear of ALL dogs everywhere, including sniffer dogs at the airport, does not mean that if you shrink back in fear from an LE dog that you are automatically a terrorist. However, there are those who would suggest that the ONLY reason to shrink from an LE dog is because one is guilty of being a terrorist.