Document ID: FAA-2003-14293-0123
Agency: faa
Document Type: Rule
Title: Timothy W. Keen
Posted Date: 2003-01-29T05:00Z

Docket Number FAA-2003-14293, otherwise known as “Ineligibility for an Airmen Certificate based on Security Grounds”, is ill conceived, poorly crafted legislation at best, and an egregious disintegration of civil liberties at worst.  The intention to safeguard the general populous from potential terrorist threats is a noble one.  However, going about protecting the public welfare by enacting knee-jerk regulation without due process, without evidence of an imminent, let alone potential threat, is bad governing and needs to be halted.  This regulation has been bulldozed into place in response (supposedly) to the terrorist acts of September 11, and will deny applicants seeking airmen certification, or suspend and possibly revoke the certificates of pilots deemed by the TSA to pose a security threat.  The flaws in this rule are many, not the least of which include:

1. The FAA did not follow it’s own established procedures for rule making.  There was no notice, no comment period, and no review.  This rule was presented as an “emergency” measure, albeit some 16 months after the event which supposedly inspired it.

2. Determination of who presents a risk, or even seemingly presents a risk, is left solely to the TSA.  No criteria have been provided for how the TSA will arrive at their judgment, and no review of their findings by a separate entity is required.  This flies in the face of some of our most basic principles, such as innocent until proven guilty, and judicial review.

3. There seem to be no protections against abuse of this policy.  If well-placed, faulty, and even anonymous accusations are made against a pilot, I’m sure the TSA will take them very seriously.  The innocent pilot will be left to provide a defense against engineered accusations.

4. There is no apparent recourse in the event an individual has been deemed a threat in error.  There is no redress of grievance.  Even our own framers of the Constitution had much to say against this method of governing.

5. Even with all of the butchered democracy set aside, no evidence has been presented suggesting that denying or revoking an airmen certificate will have any effect whatsoever on preventing aviation-related terrorist acts from occurring.  Did the FAA issue any certificates to any of the 9/11 hijackers?  It is not reasonable to assume that enacting this malformed regulation will have any effect on aviation security.  It is reasonable to assume, however, that denying or revoking a slip of paper from a determined terrorist will have no affect on their heinous mission.

Perhaps the most ludicrous part of this docket is it’s attempt to justify itself based upon possibilities: “pilots could drop chemical or biological agents from an aircraft or... crash aircraft into buildings... and flight instructors could teach terrorists how to operate aircraft.”  I’ll concede that any of these things could happen.  However, along that line of reasoning, truck drivers could load their trailers with explosives, chemical or biological agents and crash them into buildings or explode them in congested cities.  Has the TSA issued a rule to deny or revoke commercial driver’s licenses from persons known to pose, or suspected of posing, a security risk?  Taken further, is the TSA monitoring the public at large, and ordering state governments to deny or revoke driver’s licenses should an individual be deemed by the TSA to pose a security risk?  After all, anyone could rent a moving van, load it full of explosives, and set it off in front of a federal building.  Oh wait, that did happen.  That event was a tragedy to be sure, but did the government overreact by enacting broad, ill-conceived legislation to egress on the civil privileges of all drivers?  Has fertilizer been outlawed?  No.  Those things were simply a means to an end.  Taking away Timothy McVeigh’s driver’s license would not have stopped him.  Denying Mohamed Atta a pilot’s license would not have stopped him.  Extreme measures enacted on the basis of what could happen without due process, without reasonable justification, is not the way of a society whose culture was founded upon individual freedom and democratic process.

Let us protect our citizens as best we can, but do so by being diligent and mindful of our surroundings, not by needlessly terminating civil freedoms, and certainly not in this manner.  This legislation is dangerous, not so much in the actions it takes directly, but in the path it’s forging.  It opens the door for, dare I say it, Gestapo-like tactics where innocent pilots are accused of being a risk (or even a potential risk), and their rights are summarily revoked without due process.  What’s next?

Tim Keen

Commercial Pilot (at least for now)