ELI5: TSA Lines
If the TSA does not have police powers, how are they able to detain anyone to do even the search they do? If they can't legally hold you, why not walk right by them? I don't want to hear "because they can." I want the settled legal reasoning for how this is possible, or have we all just been conned into consenting to this theatre without realizing it?
Posted Sep 14, 2013, 11:36 AM UTC
323
You can walk right past them, and they can't physically stop you. But doing so is criminal, and they will call the police, who are usually standing right off to the side.
As for the searches they perform, they are all voluntary "administrative" searches.
What crime would I be committing to walk past someone who has no authority to detain me? We all do that hundreds of times a day.
The terminal area is a secure area. If you chose to enter the secure area, you are consenting to be searched. If you refuse search, you are trespassing.
I'm clearly NOT trespassing. The airline invited me there, knew of my coming, and agreed to it all in providing me a ticket in exchange for money. If I run through the gate of a stadium without a ticket, sure I'd be trespassing. Very much not the case here.
Looks like you want to post in changemyopinion not ELI5.
It would be the equivalent of buying a ticket to a sports game, going to the stadium and running onto the field, or better yet into a skybox. Sure there are some people allowed in those areas, but your one ticket doesn't entitle you to free run of the place.
Even the ACLU has acknowledged TSA's right to perform mandatory safety related searches: "In the lawsuit, Bierfeldt and the ACLU sought a court order requiring the TSA to bring its search policies into line with constitutional requirements for passenger privacy, arguing that passengers moving through pre-flight screening can only be subject to searches aimed at keeping weapons and explosives off airplanes." - https://www.aclunc.org/issues/technology/blog/tsa_fixes_search_policy_after_aclu_sues.shtml
The airlines don't usually actually own the airports or the secure area. For example, the Port Authority owns all of JFK while the airlines just rent. Not only that, but due to laws that exist you can't just bypass security when entering as it's a regulation the TSA put down on all commercial travel. The TSA is a regulatory agency and the airlines have to abide by what the TSA says. The TSA has the final say if you fly, not the airline.
Source: I'm a TSA agent.
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They'd probably halt departures and make everyone exit for re-screening.
Ding we have a winner
On the way into the terminal? They'll shut it down and you won't be flying that day. Then they'll seal the exits as best they can and bring in the riot cops and teargas and arrest everyone. Regardless, you won't be flying that day.
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That also sounds like a democracy. And a military dictatorship. And a theocracy.