Alaska Bill Would Criminalize Invasive TSA Pat Downs
Rep. Sharon Cissna’s legislation would also ban body scanners that produce naked images
Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
Thursday, February 16, 2012
A bill introduced by Alaska lawmaker and TSA grope victim Rep. Sharon Cissna would criminalize both invasive pat downs and body scans that produce naked images conducted by the federal agency, setting the stage for another states’ rights battle with the government.
When Texas lawmakers tried to pass a similar law last year, the federal government threatened to enforce a no fly zone over the lone star state, and the measure was eventually defeated after a lengthy legislative struggle.
Cissna was barred from flying by the TSA after an incident at SEA-TAC International Airport last year during which she refused to undergo an intrusive pat down after she had already passed through a naked body scanner. The scan results showed scars from her breast cancer surgery, prompting TSA officials to insist she underwent secondary screening.
“Facing the agent I began to remember what my husband and I’d decided after the previous intensive physical search. That I never had to submit to that horror again!” she said. “It would be difficult, we agreed, but I had the choice to say no, this twisted policy did not have to be the price of flying to Juneau.”
The bill introduced by Cissna, HB 262, states;
A person commits the offense of interference with access to public buildings or transportation facilities if the person, as a condition for access to a public building or transportation facility, requires another person to consent or otherwise submit to(1) physical contact by any person touching directly or through clothing the genitals, buttocks, or female breast of the person seeking access; or(2) any electronic process that produces an electronic image of the genitals, anus, or female breast or otherwise creates an electronic image of the person seeking access that exposes or reveals a physical characteristic that is normally hidden by clothing and is not normally visible to the public.
Cissna’s legislation goes further than the Texas bill in that it bans body scanners that produce naked images. The abuse of such technology was in the news again this week after the TSA forced a woman to go through a body scanner three times at DFW International Airport so TSA screeners in a back room could get a “good look” at her “cute” figure.
- A d v e r t i s e m e n t
Cissna “told the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday that rights guaranteed in the constitutions of Alaska and the United States are violated by security measures that require unwanted physical contact or exposure of physical traits usually not visible in public,” reports the Associated Press.
In a related development, lawmakers in Salt Lake City have introduced a resolution that seeks to put a stop to invasive pat downs and launch a Congressional investigation into the abuses of the TSA itself.
“If they can do that, what can’t they do?” Rep. Ken Ivory, the sponsor of the resolution asked. “Can you imagine George Washington or Thomas Jefferson going to the airport and saying, ‘Go ahead and stick your hand down my pants. I need to get where I’m going?’”
Ivory decries the fact that Americans are being conditioned “to just submit” to the feds. “Our liberties are being conditioned away,” he told the Deseret News.
The TSA is facing a series of confrontations over the next few months, with Texas State Rep. David Simpson set to resurrect the Traveler Dignity Act, the aforementioned bill that would have made invasive TSA groping a criminal offense in Texas, as well as the passage of a new law which now opens the door for airports to evict the TSA from the security screening process altogether.
Read the full text of HB 262 below.
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