The
Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is
tightening its grip on domestic travcel. I don't mean
the random, unpredictable security checks at bus, subway
and train stations which already exist. I mean a
coordinated and systematic police control of internal
travel within America. Groundwork is being laid.
Application
to Make U.S. Into an Airport Screening Zone The
application was tucked away on page 71431 of Volume 77,
Number 231 of the Federal Register (November 30). It was
surrounded by soporific references to forwarding "the
new Information Collection Request (ICR) abstracted
below to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for
review and approval under the Paperwork Reduction Act
(PRA)."
The
application for funding from the TSA constitutes a
preliminary step toward systematically expanding TSA's
authority from airports to highways and almost every
other means of public travel. The expansion would erase
one of the last remaining differences between the US and
a total police state; namely, the ability to travel
internally without being under police surveillance. The
total police state you experience at airports wants to
spill into roads and bus stops, to subways and trains.
Or, rather, the TSA wants to solidify and spread the
fledgling and erratic presence it already has. The
official request reads, "TSA's Highway BASE program
[Baseline Assessment for Security Enhancement] seeks to
establish the current state of security gaps and
implemented countermeasures throughout the highway mode
of transportation by posing questions to major
transportation asset owners and operators." An example
would be an owner and the employees of a long-haul truck
company. The application continues, "Data and results
collected through the Highway BASE program will inform
TSA's policy and program initiatives and allow TSA to
provide focused resources and tools to enhance the
overall security posture within the surface
transportation community."
Meanwhile,
the Government Security News Service provides additional
details on TSA's plans. TSA wants funding to conduct
"security-related assessments" on about 750
"transportation assets" including "140 public
transportation agencies." An example would be bus depots
or train stations.
Security
Magazine (May 30th) offered a sense of how sweeping the
definition of "assets" might be, including "trucking,
school bus, and motor coach industries, privately-owned
highway assets that may include bridges and tunnels, and
other related systems and assets owned and operated by
state departments of education and transportation."
At this
point, the goal is merely "an assessment." But when did
a government agency ever conclude that it didn't need
funding, expansion and more power? This is especially
true of the militarized TSA that treats the public as
"hostiles."
The
fact that the agency lamented the lack of a "single
database" on public transportation is not reassuring.
(Federal Register, Vol.77, No.104, pg. 31867, May 30.)
The entire push seems aimed at not merely expanding but
also centralizing information, efforts and authority,
with BASE itself being a consolidation of several other
TSA programs.
Travel
Authorities Will Comply
Private
companies and public travel authorities will co-operate
with this "voluntary" program of assessment and with
whatever policies result. They will co-operate for two
reasons: the stick and the carrot.
The
stick: The BASE program is voluntary in the same sense
that compliance with TSA demands at airport screening
are voluntary - which is to say, not at all. A company
that refuses to comply is likely to receive the same
harassment and extra scrutiny as passengers who refuse
to be screened.
The
carrot: the May 30th Federal Register report listed one
use to which data from the TSA assessments would be put.
It would "inform...the most effective application of
available resources, including funds distributed under
the Transit Security Grant Program." In short,
government money will flow to the compliant. The case of
Amtrak is instructive.
On
March 3rd, 2011, Trains: The Magazine of Railroading ran
the headline: "TRAINS Exclusive: Amtrak police chief
bars Transportation Security Administration from some
security operations." The article went on to describe
how TSA personnel "took over" an Amtrak station on their
own authority and "thoroughly searched every person who
entered." When Amtrak Police Chief John O'Connor found
out, he was reportedly "livid" and insisted on
restricting the TSA's authority before he would consider
"allowing them back on Amtrak property."
On
October 9th, 2012, Homeland Security Today - the
official magazine of the Department of Homeland Security
(DHS) - announced that DHS had forged a partnership
Amtrak by which "over 8,000 frontline transportation
employees and Amtrak Police Department officers" will be
trained.
How did
Amtrak go from threatening to evict the TSA (an agency
within DHS) to joining enthusiastically in the
harassment of passengers? What happened in a
year-and-a-half? Money happened. In 2011, Amtrak
received $1.5 billion in federal funds and broke records
with 30 million passengers; it still lost money.
Amtrak's losses were so huge and persistent that one of
Mitt Romney's campaign promises was to privatize the
behemoth. By partnering with national security in
October, however, Amtrak guaranteed both funding and
survival no matter who won the election.
No
wonder so many transit authorities are scrambling to be
"golden." The Gold Award is the highest score a
transportation provider can receive from the TSA. It is
achieved by obtaining high ratings in 17 categories in
Security and Emergency Preparedness. Who do you think
will be first in line for federal hand-outs? Compliance
with the TSA will be high.
The
Amtrak dynamic also points to how the TSA will solve a
major problem in monitoring internal travel; namely, it
doesn't have enough personnel to cover the vast
stretches and variety of internal transportation. The
TSA doesn't need them. All it needs to do is co-opt the
existing personnel of railroads and buses, of trucking
and subways. If it does so, then the TSA will acquire
100,000s of de facto agents who are trained to report
back on any suspicious activity or people.
Airport-style
control of travel within America is coming. Some would
argue it has been here for decades in the form of speed
limits. But what's coming is different in kind. The
unmarked police cars hiding in bushes are after your
money; the uniformed TSA agents and their "partners"
want your freedom, your obedience, and control of your
life.
Conclusion
The
Constitution will not protect the right to travel.
Although many legal scholars consider it to be a
Constitutional right akin to freedom of association, the
word "travel" or its equivalent does not appear in the
document except to guarantee the right of Congress
members to travel back and forth from 'work'. The
Supreme Court case Sáenz v. Roe (1999) rejected
the Constitutional basis of free travel and rooted it
instead within judicial precedent. These are weak roots
and shallow soil.
Those
who fret over their continued ability to travel abroad
should glance over their shoulders to glimpse what is
happening to travel within America. The two are
politically connected, intimately so. Many of the same
methods that now restrict foreign travel will be used
within America because the same agency will handle both:
the TSA in its many manifestations. They might be called
BASE agents or VIPRs (Visible Intermodal Prevention and
Response), like the ones who partnered with law
enforcement in 2011 in Tennessee to conduct random
"terrorist" checkpoints on highways. They may be the
specially trained clerks who sell you a ticket . But TSA
agents in whatever guise are coming to the highway, bus
stop and train station you frequent.