Oral arguments took place yesterday in front of a 3-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in my case challenging the constitutionality of subjecting all air travelers to machines that image every inch of their body and pat-downs that literally put the TSA’s hands in your pants. The pressing issue on the judges’ minds: Can the court even hear this case?
That’s the question every court has given me so far. First I filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, my home district, where typically a civil action challenging constitutionality of government assholery would start. But, the TSA argued that I’m challenging a written TSA policy (an “order”), not an individual instance of a search, and Congress made a special law that sends those challenges to the Court of Appeals. But that law also says that challenges must be made within 60 days of the policy’s issuance unless “reasonable grounds” exist.
If the Court doesn’t find “reasonable grounds,” it will mean that if I get searched tomorrow and want to challenge the constitutionality of that search, it will already be too late to challenge it, because the time limit to challenge it starts not on the date you were abused, but on the date the government declared it would abuse you. This would be a disgusting abrogation of the Bill of Rights, essentially allowing the government to put us on notice that they want to take away any one of our constitutional rights and, should we not speak up within 60 days (what if the law said 3 days? or 24 hours?), those rights are permanently gone. I do hope the panel doesn’t go in that direction.
While I worry that the judges may rule that constitutional rights can be time limited, they did ask some tough questions of the government. Many times throughout the government’s arguments did a judge ask a question and the government’s attorney attempted to evade the question — but the judges would have none of it. I appreciate the firmness of the court in requiring the government to directly answer questions about the consequences of accepting its perverse arguments.
Audio from the oral arguments is a public record and I’m sending my request for it today — will post it here once I receive it.
Professional Troublemaker ® 
Thank you for all you are doing Jon. I wish I could have been there to support you only I stopped flying in late 2009 after having my luggage ripped apart for an hour and it and my hands chemically swabbed. I can only imagine what the people getting the scanning and frisking go through. A real patriot challenges government authority and you are one.
EXACTLY
“Then don’t talk, drive!”
Catherine Mary Stewart, 1984
(Don’t overestimate the profundity of this quote: It’s a line from “The Last Starfighter”)
I hope things go in your favor you’ve invested so much in this. Thank you for all you are doing.
You have constitutional rights? What’s the legal definition of a “right”? Who gave you these rights? Can they take them away? “This constitution has either enabled the government to become what it has, or it was powerless to stop it.” Lysander Spooner (paraphrased).
Why would anyone challenge a system with the system? The game’s rigged, man. It’s like going to a thief to beg him for your stuff back, then when he denies taking it (as its sitting in front of you), demands you prove he stole it and that it was yours in the first place, denies your claim, then by taking it to his parents in an “appeal”; of course you’re not getting your stuff back! They’ll take your money AND your property, and laugh about it behind closed doors when you left out, disappointed.
To quote Nietzsche, “Everything the government says is lies, everything it has, it has stolen.”.
Keep up the fight, but don’t be surprised when they just spin you away and out.
My case, there was never any “right to be informed”, evidence, witnesses, or the “right” to a hearing. Got it all the way to the 4th federal cir court of appeals, and they denied because they don’t need evidence… they refused a mandatory judicial notice (citing the SCOTUS), AND they cited a lower court case in which the plaintiff was a party! Due process? “Rights”? FUCK YOU! PAY UP, they say.
The very existence of the TSA and the DHS is un-Constitutional, so it comes at no surprise that the Federal legal ‘system’ is an abrogation of our unalienable right to life, liberty, and property. The U.S. Congress are duplicitous at best.
Can the TSA retroactively declare public information “secret”?
http://www.papersplease.org/wp/
Ars Technica asks DHS for Passenger Name Records data but gets none of it:
Can I see what information the feds have on my travel?
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/ask-ars-can-i-see-what-the-feds-know-about-where-ive-traveled/
TSA includes all air travelers in pre-crime profiling:
http://www.papersplease.org/wp/2014/05/23/tsa-includes-all-air-travelers-in-pre-crime-profiling/
About how long for deliberations?
When did it become a Constitution Right to fly on a commercial airline which is owned by someone else? Would you allow me to ride in your car with a bomb in my possession or any weapon that could do you and family member any hard? Think about how many ways I can conceal something that you wouldn’t be able to find. That’s what I thought.
I have zero problems with flying or any problem with TSA doing what they have to do to keep you or anyone safe from me, but you better be sure I want to be safe from you.
Since 9/11, this has been the longest stretch in the history of aviation that a commercial aircraft hasn’t been hijacked on US soil. Think about it. TSA must be doing something right, but there are people who would complained if they were hanged with a new rope.
The airlines are licensed to provide a public mode of transportation. Within guidelines, they are not allowed to refuse service to anyone. Much like radio stations are required to provide
public service within their broadcast area, the airlines are regulated by the FAA to provide public transportation. They may be “owned by someone else,” but they’re only allowed to
operate if they follow the FED’s description of what they are to do, not their’s. Its the terms they agree to to have the privilege to operate.
You may feel fine being groped and watching others be groped to allow you to feel you are safer, but we don’t all feel the same as you do, nor do we feel the gropers make us any safer. There are those of us, like myself, who would rather take my chances with the “bad” guys, than be certain of my lack of safety in maintaining personal freedoms with the likes of the tyrants of DHS and their minions.
Regarding your attempted correlation of reduced highjackings since 9/11 to the introduction of the TSA into our pre-airspace, I would say that major crimes in general have all been reduced in frequency significantly over that same time (and prior). There are many potential reasons that could be attributed for that, not the least of which is that our country has escalated it race to become a police state, has greatly increased it’s prison population to that of #1 in the world, etc., and there is likely no correlation to reduced hijackings and the presence of the TSA…not that’s ever been proven, anyway, and certainly not (in my opinion) that a critical observer would attribute to that bumbling agency.
It is common sense that if you give up freedom for [the illusion of] greater safety from [strawmen] “bad guys,” you will definitely and permanently have less freedom; and, given the fact that those you gave it to required you hand over your freedom first before they would give you “more safety,” you will definitely have less safety from them, and likely less safety from the boogie man, too. In other words, you’re better off relying on yourself and your neighbors (provided your “governers” keep they noses out of your ability to defend yourselves).
Then again, if your the sniveling type that can’t do anything for yourself, then, by all means, pay for a hired gun/bodyguard…just like the double standard elitists like Bloomberg and most all of Hollywood.
“When did it become a Constitution Right to fly on a commercial airline which is owned by someone else?”
It’s not the airlines that are demanding I submit to molestation, it’s the government. That’s where my constitutional rights come into play.
Your classic “tiger repellent” argument is textbook false causation. Do you *really* think that a determined terrorist could not penetrate the TSA? Don’t make me laugh.
Your rights come from 4 pieces of parchment which were drafted in secret, by 50 dead people, over 200 years ago, to “promise” to never abuse their authority? And this has any meaning in present day, even to the malign group of thieves, killers, and liars calling themselves a government? You’re smarter than that man. Way smarter.
Those “pieces of parchment” hold the value that I and my countrymen demand that they have. I’ve spent 1,000+ hours over the last 4 years in my government’s face, insisting that my rights be respected. What are *you* doing?
Ah, the ad hominem. I’ve fought them. I did my own “civil” case with those bastards for over three years, and they never respected anyone’s rights, least of all mine, and no constitution or any notion of “fairness” ever stopped any of them from railroading me.
You’re mistaken if you believe I think your efforts are wasted. I’m simply stating that your “rights” (as you term them) don’t come from a government. They come from your humanity. You’re too smart for statism.
> I’m simply stating that your “rights” (as you term them) don’t come from a government. They come from your humanity.
Our rights are respected when the powers that be (and those they command) feel that they should or must be respected. The only way to ensure this respect is to create and maintain a culture that calmly, but loudly points out serious disrespect and demands corrective action.
Life is just as fair as we are able to make it. A few largely powerless men cannot stand against several empowered ones. In order to resist those who would unfairly force their will on us, we must convince our neighbors, our judges, our lawyers, and our congresscritters to stand with us. This is a difficult task with a very high rate of failure, but it must be done.
Can you speak about the details of your case?
Though, I disagree with you on almost every point. It all boils down to public relations to cover up the gun in the room. It’s a group of people who will kill you for your “freedom”. The PR is that governments exist to protect life, liberty, and property, and they meet these ends by destroying…life, liberty, and property. Makes perfect sense. There is more chaos in this world and more people have died in the last two centuries by industrialized democide than by all the other causes of death on record; so please don’t tell me that my “rights” (which are really just a legal claim with no other substantiation or evidence other than …???…God???) will be respected by a cabal of vampiric, self serving, self aggrandizing, murderous thugs, who live on the blood and sacrifice of others, who have promised to not abuse their “authority”, yet publicly do so at every occasion the histories can catalog (and still do to this day). It’s getting worse, and plebs are starting to realize it. In short, “Government is why we can’t have nice things.”. Period.
My case? TSA says I tried to “Artfully smuggle a 10″ dagger” aboard an airplane. An item which was allowed in a checked bag, was never allowed to check my bag, and a civil complaint was filed when I demanded evidence, names of witnesses, and copies of any and all reports associated with their claims.
All were denied without grounds. They lied to senators and “representatives” in an official inquiries.
I demanded a hearing. Which was staffed and judged all by DHS employees.
Was denied the right to inquire into the cause and nature of the charge. Was denied venue and jurisdictional challenge without grounds.
Was denied any and all “constitutional rights” to face my accuser, from self incrimination, even a “right” to a “fair hearing” (of which there was none.)
The plaintiff (the TSA, by a horrible excuse for a man named Scott Klippel) withheld evidence, lied in an unsworn complaint, and had his burden of proof taken up by the bench (a DHS/Coast Guard “officer” named Michael Divine) and every challenge, objection, and inquiry was arbitrarily denied without grounds.
Then I appealed to, guess who, the TSA “decision maker”, who promptly sided with their own agency and patron office.
THEN I take it to the 4th cir court of appeals Richmond, and I give them “mandatory” judicial notice from the SCOTUS citing several of their own cases that stated that once challenged, the burden of proof shifts to the plaintiff in all maters ranging from jurisdiction to evidence to witnesses
The 4th cir promptly cites a case, you may have heard of “Corbett v US” 2nd cir, which stated that unless the TSA is found to be “arbitrary of capricious”, it must be allowed to do anything it deems “necessary”…
So much for your constitution. Fuck you, pay us. (The People vs. US) That’s how much your constitution is worth. Zero. No constitution in existence (yes, other nations have them) has ever prevented anyone’s “rights” or human sanctity to be violated at the needs and whims of the state. Its been that way since 10,000 years ago, and humanity is no where closer to evolving past a pyramidal top down force is right power structure.
I’m done. Please unsubscribe me.
ther is only one behavior a defeatest knows how to do… be defeated. Thanks for not being a defeatist Jon
“The only winning move is not to play.” -Wargames.
Improvements in MRIs, passenger screening, other image-detection applications on the horizon:
Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories, along with collaborators from Rice University and the Tokyo Institute of Technology, are developing new terahertz detectors based on carbon nanotubes that could lead to significant improvements in medical imaging, airport passenger screening, food inspection and other applications.
A paper in Nano Letters journal, “Carbon Nanotube Terahertz Detector,” debuted in the May 29 edition of the publication’s “Just Accepted Manuscripts” section. The paper describes a technique that uses carbon nanotubes to detect light in the terahertz frequency range without cooling.
https://share.sandia.gov/news/resources/news_releases/carbon_nanotubes/#.U5sn7HkU-Uk