Yes, for me as a regular US citizen.

But ask some US permanent residents. They use the I-551 permanent residency card at the kiosks.

They still have to have a valid passport.

Is EWR the worst airport to clear TSA in the US?
 

Flying AA today from TA, gate 37. No pre-check and only ONE TSA person checking in people for the ridiculous long line. Took 40 minutes today. Even with that stupid card for "expedited screening" means nothing as you still have to remove laptop and liquids. You can't go through the WTMD either with anything in your pockets unlike other airports (IE belt and wallet).

Is there any plan to clean up this mess there?

No. Not any time soon, anyway. The new head of TSA, Neffenger, is tasked with improving the agency's dismal test scores. He's responding, in part, by work slowdowns because he believes that efficiency and thoroughness are incompatible. He's also trying to use the manufactured long lines to spur people to sign up for Pre and to get more money out of Congress, even as TSA performance continues to decline.

Unfortunately, signing up for Pre when some FSDs don't support the program and won't staff it at their airports isn't the best way to boost enrolment.

It's gonna be a long summer. (sigh). No sign that the airlines or airports are really pushing back.

SEA has hired 19 people to assist with TSA 'administrative' checkpoint functions, hoping to free up 19 TSA employees to open additional checkpoints and to staff dedicated Pre lanes. No idea who is going to pick up the tab. It appears that the situation is not expected to improve before October, at the earliest.

Retention continues to be a huge problem. Neffenger set up a new TSA 'academy' in GA so training would be consistent. This means all TSOs will be taken off the job and sent to FA for two weeks training. SEA has newly-hired TSOs who can't actually do anything until they get a slot for the GA training. Neffenger has agreed with WA's elected officials to re-institute some local training to help with the mess he has created, but there is no word when the local training will be re-started.

Last month, 1000 pax missed flights at SEA alone because of the long lines.

I find no open positions for TSO's in the Newark area. EWR must be fully staffed.

Yeah, after this summer, nobody's going to be foolish enough to point out the TSA's failures again. :rolleyes:

Mike

From my search of USAJOBS.GOV there are 78 new hire TSO positions open across the United States. The system reports 82 but 4 of those are not TSO positions. I don't get the TSA claims of being short staffed if there are so few open jobs. And most of those open slots are not in big cities.

I think TSA (Neffenger) is playing Congress and using an angry public to raise the table stakes.

Too many of the staff (LTSOs, STSOs, BDOs) are non-working.

Here's some gobbelty-gook speak from Neffenger to a Congressional committee. Would anyone care to read it and tell us if it says anything substantial as I don't see that it does:

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/...esting-airport

Neffenger is talking circles around the known security vunerability of unscreened airport workers, that he has no plan to screen those people, and that he has no clue on how to provide better security.

About the only thing Neffenger brings to the table is a bigger effort to punish travelers for complaining about TSA incompetence.

I'm starting to think that Neffenger is going to challenge Kippy as worst TSA Administrator

This isn't a response to past pax complaints.

This is about repeatedly failing tests, something that has nothing to do with the pax. Pax didn't design the tests or cause the failures or publish the results - or dare to suggest someone ought to be held accountable for the failures.

Pax will, however, pay the price.

Here's a follow-up:

http:/lawnewz.com/high-profile/tsa-administrator-makes-startling-admission-about-airport-security/

http://lawnewz.com/high-profile/tsa-...port-security/

I thought the legislation that made TSA also gave TSA the authority to create whatever regulations that the administrator thought necessary for TSA to secure commercial aviation.

Sure. Here's what I got out of it:

Nelson: What have you done?
Neffinger: A lot
Nelson: Such as?
Neffinger: Call me next week.

Mike

That sounds about right.