Is the TSA “screening” for threats to aviation, or for cash and drugs?
A class-action lawsuit filed this week in Pittsburgh by the Institute for Justice, Brown v. TSA, exposes the dirty non-secret that TSA checkpoints are used primarily as drug checkpoints and as a revenue center for law enforcement agencies, not to protect aviation.
Warrantless, suspicionless dragnet administrative searches at TSA checkpoints are justified as measures to “screen” travelers for weapons, explosives, and other threats to aviation.
When the actions of TSA Transportation Security “Officers” are challenged in court, the TSA has claimed that its “Officers” are not the “officers” referred to in the Federal Tort Claims Act (“any officer of the United States who is empowered by law to execute searches, to seize evidence, or to make arrests for violations of Federal law”) ; conduct only limited administrative searches for weapons, explosives, and threats to aviation; do not have any authority to conduct searches for any other purpose; and neither have nor exercise authority to arrest or seize travelers.
In practice, however, the primary use of TSA checkpoints by the government is to “screen” travelers for drugs and cash, and to seize and expropriate illegal drugs, drug-related cash, and all “large” sums of cash being carried by airline passengers, regardless of the presence or absence of any evidence linking that cash to illegal drugs or any other illegal activity.