Big Brother at the airport

Very soon the summer travel season will be upon us and, with it, ever longer lines at Transportation Security Agency passenger identification and screening checkpoints.
Most people understand why physically and mechanically screening passengers and baggage is necessary, given that last year TSA uncovered nearly 7,000 guns on persons or in the checked baggage, with more than 90% of the weapons loaded. But with only one gun found per 8 million screened passengers, it’s clear the bigger reason for TSA’s long lines is identification checks.
Of course the government would want to know the identity of someone who just attempted to bring a loaded gun onboard an aircraft. But what business is it of TSA or anybody else who I am or why I’m flying from Washington, D.C., to St. Louis?
Unless a passenger is wanted for a federal crime, it’s not the government’s business, but TSA has made it its business despite the fact the law authorizing it to screen your person and baggage does not give it authority to demand you show your driver’s license.
Instead, TSA has relied on nonpublic “Security Directives” that can only be challenged under procedures outlined in federal law. And, in theory, starting next year under the so-called REAL ID law, you will not be able to fly domestically unless you have either a state-issued ID that meets REAL ID criteria, a valid U.S. passport, or military identification card.
And just for good measure, TSA is eager to mandate that you submit to facial recognition scanning as well.
Scanning people and bags for dangerous items is a legitimate safety and security measure. But using the law to force you to produce an ID and submit to facial recognition scanning is a form of mass surveillance and population control, the hallmarks of odious regimes such as Communist China and the Russian Federation. They are a clear-cut assault on the Bill of Rights and have no place in a functioning constitutional republic such as ours.
The facial recognition threat is one with which Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) is very familiar. In 2023, Merkley was at Reagan National Airport, tried to opt out of the facial recognition process, and was instructed by a transportation security officer to stand aside so other passengers could get scanned.
Merkley was incensed enough about the incident that he subsequently introduced the Traveler Privacy Protection Act, a bipartisan bill that would ban facial recognition technology use at U.S. airports unless explicitly authorized by Congress.
While there is some value in the use of facial recognition technology and other biometrics as an access control measure for sensitive airport infrastructure, wholesale facial recognition technology or biometric screenings of passengers not wanted for a crime should be prohibited by law. In that sense, Merkley and his colleagues are on the right track with respect to facial recognition technology.
Even so, Merkley and his Senate and House colleagues would do well to take a step back and reask that first-order question posed earlier: If an individual is not wanted for a crime, why should they have to present an ID to get on a plane if they’ve paid for the ticket?
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As recently as 1999, the Supreme Court affirmed the right to travel as a basic constitutional right. But in 2007 it declined to hear a case challenging TSA’s use of nonpublic “Security Directives” to airlines requiring presentation of ID to board a flight. Congress could end this problem by simply amending TSA’s authorizing statute to stipulate that only passengers who attempt to board an aircraft with firearms, explosives, or incendiary devices shall be required to produce identification.
Otherwise, whether you’re traveling to visit your parents, Disney World, Yosemite, or anywhere else, it’s none of the government’s business.
Patrick Eddington is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and a former CIA analyst and House senior policy adviser.