jfunk138

I agree with those saying there is still not enough information to determine exactly what happened here.

But... I think everyone here can agree that anything that draws scrutiny to the potential for TSA abuse of power is useful. It's probably a good bet that a large number of folks that got harassed were formerly "Anything For Security"™ sheeple. They are now converts to the TSA is a lawless, broken, ineffective organization school of thought.

TSA is all fun and games until the abuse happens to you.

Boggie Dog

I've taken coloring books and such to my grand daughters in carry-on and TSA has pull my bags for extra screening. Apparently TSA x-rays can see through metal computers but not paper books. Or is it another case of the watchers don't really understand what a threat item looks like. Green and leafy= threat item. Rectangular paper mass = threat item.

And yes, we pay just a bit less than $8,000,000,000.00 yearly for this level of expertise.

I don't think our tax dollars are being put to good use.

PTravel

I'm not going to turn this into a political discussion, other than to say threats were made against Obama, too.

The question also isn't whether flights to DC were subject to inspection, but whether women going to the march were subject to inspection. As I said, it is not "prudent," it is unconstitutional.

That's right, which is why I said "if . . ." My post was in response to someone who said if it had happened it would be difficult to prove. My point was that it was not difficult to proved. IF IT HAD HAPPENED.

Again, the question isn't whether flights to certain cities get more inspections, but whether women going to a protest march got more inspections.

There are two types of unconstitutional violations: prima facie and as-applied. A government action is prima facie unconstitutional if, on its face, it violates the Constitution, e.g. a law prohibiting protest marches of any kind. An otherwise permissible regulation may still be unconstitutional if it is applied in an unconstitutional manner, e.g. singling out people with Muslim-sounding names for "random" searches at airports.

Once again, I didn't say TSOs were doing this. I've said repeatedly that there is not enough information. What I DID say was, as a matter of law, the violation could be proven statistically.

That's right, which is why I've repeatedly said there is not enough information. My post was about HOW a violation would be proven IF ONE HAD OCCURRED.

As I said, I don't want to turn this into a political discussion, but some posters seem really touchy about this.

Boggie Dog

INAL but I could sit on a jury hearing a case like this. With the little information presented there is no way that I would get that opportunity.

The facts as I see them is that TSA is known to do gate searches. I don't have their SOP on when and how those searches are conducted. It appears from other comments that TSA might concentrate that kind of search to aircraft bound for D.C.. If true then I still don't see a problem. The particular flight in question reportedly had a large percentage of women headed to the marches in D.C., a legal activity. The search of all of the people on that flight at TSA's normal checkpoint would have been 8 women to 1 man if women made up 80% of the passengers and if a gate search was conducted it will still be about the same ratio unless the search was targeted, although the male/female ratio of the screeners would have some bearing on that also.

We have zero information on what actually happened during the gate search so no conclusions can be drawn if the search was a violation or not.

I think the person who sent out the original tweet did a disservice by not providing additional information. TSA doesn't deserve any slack but without more information this is not the battle to fight.

PTravel

Exactly. I am a lawyer and I explained as-applied unconstitutionality.

If you sit on a jury, the judge tells you what the law is -- you don't get to decide for yourself.

Boggie Dog

I don't think I have made any statements of what the law is, in fact I believe I am supporting your earlier statements.

What have I said in my comments that are not supportive of the law based on the facts that we know about this incident?

PTravel

Oy. As I've said repeatedly, there aren't enough facts about this incident. The point, though, is, that constitutionality is a question of law, not fact. Jurors are fact-finders, only.

jkhuggins

Except for jury nullification, but that would send us off on a whole other tangent, which we shouldn't do ....

Back on subject now.

Unfortunately, because TSA chooses to conceal how it conducts much of its operation, citing "security", it invites precisely this sort of speculation. It's possible that these flights were specifically targeted as political retaliation; it's also possible that the random-number generator TSA used to select flights for enhanced screening made an unfortunate choice.

But all that TSA will probably say publicly --- if it says anything at all --- is something along the lines of "trust us, we don't do that". The reactions to that statement will reveal more about the responder than about the TSA.

Global321

I believe TSA is specifically banned from profiling. And just because someone says they are targeted, doesn't mean they were.

Any threats against any president are taken seriously. I don't think that is a political statement.

If the flights to DC were subject to inspection, then the people on those flights are subject to inspection. If there were women on those flights, there is no question as to whether or not they too were subject to inspection. They were.

I simply do not follow your logic as to what was unconstitutional. Extra searches on flights to DC on inauguration weekend? Searching women on the plane?

jeffhacker

I trust that this is tongue in cheek. <deleted>

GUWonder

The whole PreCheck scam is based on faith in profiling. The whole human trafficking interdiction effort by the TSA is based on faith in profiling. These are schemes that government lawyers have cleared for use. They aren't the only examples of profiling used by or on behalf of the TSA.

chollie

The truth is, we don't actually know if they are specifically banned from profiling, because their SOP is SSI. What we do know is that they have been caught profiling in the past.

Global321

PreCheck scam? PreCheck is great! I have nothing to hide. Check away and let me get quickly through security. Spend more time on those that do not want to give up information.

If it is cleared by gov't lawyers, it would be safe to assume they believe their process is legal/constitutional. And, until a court says otherwise, it is.

In 2013, the TSA reviewed and revised all training documents to emphasize that unlawful profiling violates agency policy and anti-discrimination laws are ineffective as a security tool because terrorism has no "typical" face, race, nationality, ethnicity or gender.
(source CNN)

Do they? I guess that is the debate here.

thegrailer

I am not jumping into the argument about what happened but as someone who at one point lived in a stats filled world, statistics don't "prove" anything. Statistics may help describe something or show a relationship or how likely an outcome --- they do not "prove" anything.


Cheers -

PTravel

I'm talking about admissible evidence to prove liability.