In a real eyebrow-raiser of a press release made on Wednesday, June 4, the Trump Department of Homeland Security announced that it had caught the Transportation Security Administration and a Democratic Senator in a major corruption scandal involving flying with a possible terrorist.
According to the Kristi Noem-led DHS, the husband of New Hampshire Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, William “Billy” Shaheen, was caught traveling three times in just one year with an alleged terrorist, landing him on a TSA surveillance program, which Sen. Shaheen was then able to get him off of by lobbying the TSA.
Beginning that press release, the DHS announced that it had found yet another example of the Biden TSA weaponizing its watchlist program against conservatives, such as Tulsi Gabbard. It began, “Today, the Department of Homeland Security revealed evidence detailing the politicization of TSA’s watchlisting program under the Biden administration.”
Continuing, the press release noted, “Discovered documents, correspondence, and timelines clearly highlight the Biden’s inconsistent application of Silent Partners Quiet Skies and watchlisting programs, circumventing security policies to benefit politically aligned friends and family at the expense of the American people.”
Getting into how Sen. Shaheen and her husband were involved in the scandal, the press release explained, “This includes William “Billy” Shaheen, spouse of fellow democrat and sitting U.S. New Hampshire Senator, Jeanne Shaheen, while surveilling political opponents like Tulsi Gabbard months after.”
Building on that, the press release noted, “After Senator Shaheen directly lobbied the former Administrator, Pekoske gave repeated, explicit direction to exclude Shaheen from the Silent Partner Quiet Skies list. Pekoske granted Billy Shaheen a blanket Silent Partners Quiet Skies exemption despite Shaheen flying with a Known or Suspected Terrorist on three occasions.”
Explaining what happened in a timeline, the DHS noted that Shaheen was caught flying with a “Known or Suspected Terrorist (KST)” as a co-traveler twice on July 20, 2023, and then again on October 18, 2023, and was placed on the Open Skies watchlist because of his traveling companion on October 20 of that year.
Sen. Shaheen then reportedly pressured the TSA to remove her husband from the watchlist and the TSA went along with it, putting him on an exclusion list despite his terrorist connection. DHS added, “Billy Shaheen stayed on the Secure Flight Exclusion List for 18 months until current TSA leadership removed him.”
That contrasts quite strongly with how conservatives were treated. Noting that conservatives like Tulsi were kept on the list as various high-profile foriegners and Democrats like Shaheen were given exemptions by the Biden TSA, the DHS report also noted, “All the while, Tulsi Gabbard, and many other Americans, were placed on the Silent Partners’ Quiet Skies list with little to no visibility, awareness, explanation, or oversight. Billy Shaheen was hardly the only high-profile individual that was placed on this exclusion list. This list also included members of foreign royal families, political elites, professional athletes, and journalists. Shaheen’s blanket exemption has since been revoked.”
Kristi Noem, commenting on the situation, directly alleged that the TSA watchlist program had been weaponized by the Biden Administration against normal conservatives, saying, “It is clear that this program was used as a political rolodex of the Biden Administration—weaponized against its political foes and to benefit their well-heeled friends.”
Continuing, Secretary Noem noted that what should have been a program about keeping Americans safe as they travel instead became a corruption-ridden political program. She said, “This program should have been about the equal application of security, instead it was corrupted to be about political targeting. The Trump Administration will restore the integrity, privacy, and equal application of the law for all Americans, including aviation screening.”
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