>From AOPA_epilot: New secret Tribunals
AOPA TO CHALLENGE NEW SECURITY RULE
AOPA President Phil Boyer told a gathering of some 400 pilots Tuesday night
that the new Transportation Security Administration (TSA)/FAA security rule
allowing the FAA to revoke pilot certificates goes too far. He vowed that
AOPA will challenge portions of the rule that tread on pilot rights. "We
certainly support lawful efforts to prevent terrorists from using aircraft
to attack the United States," Boyer said during an AOPA Pilot Town Meeting
in Baltimore, "but this rule smacks of McCarthyism. The TSA has become
judge, jury, and executioner. What's happened to due process?" Last Friday,
TSA and the FAA implemented new rules that direct the FAA to revoke the
pilot certificate of anyone that TSA determines is a threat to
transportation or national security. But the process provides no independent
review. A pilot can only appeal the threat determination back to TSA-and
TSA, because of national security concerns, doesn't have to reveal the
information implicating the pilot. Boyer said that AOPA legal and technical
staff are already researching the new rules, noting that AOPA's legal
counsel's preliminary opinion is that TSA exceeded the authority Congress
had granted it. Boyer said that AOPA immediately brought its concerns to TSA
management. And Boyer will begin personally presenting those same concerns
to members of Congress next week.
©2003 Chet Gardiner |
