By now, it is becoming clear that TSA screeners know that recording is allowed at security checkpoints in airports, they just choose to tell passengers that it is not allowed with the hope that the passenger will not know any better.
No different than the routine we see from police and security guards on a daily basis.
After all, the policy has been in effect since the inception of the Transportation Security Administration in 2002 and numerous videos have surfaced where TSA screeners have been forced to acknowledge that recording at checkpoints is allowed.
And you would think that someone would mention it to them in their training considering the TSA has had the information posted onits blog in very easy-to-read language since 2009.
We don’t prohibit public, passengers or press from photographing, videotaping, or filming at screening locations. You can take pictures at our checkpoints as long as you’re not interfering with the screening process or slowing things down. We also ask that you do not film or take pictures of our monitors.
In the above video recorded earlier this month at an airport that I didn’t see mentioned, a mother begins recording as TSA screeners attempt to frisk her daughter who is in a wheelchair.
The girl who appears to be around three is crying and saying she doesn’t want to go to Disney World, so you can imagine how scared she must have been.
The mother starts video recording and the TSA screener tells her it is illegal to record.
The mother continues recording, saying nobody is going to touch her daughter unless she records it.
The screeners eventually back down from harassing her.
But the mother was obviously intimidated from recording their faces, which is something we all must learn to do when we find ourselves in such a situation.
This is at least the third time in less than a year that a video has emerged of TSA screeners attemping to frisk children in wheelchairs.
But it is the umpteenth time they’ve tried to tell passengers that video recording is illegal.
UPDATE: Fox News has more details on the incident.
The incident happened on Feb. 9th at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport.
Forck and his wife Annie, along with their three children were heading to Disney World for a family vacation. Lucy, their three-year-old, has Spina bifida and is confined to a wheelchair.
The family managed to make it through the TSA checkpoint without any problems. But as they prepared to walk to their gate, a TSA agent pulled aside Lucy for additional screening measures.
“They specifically told me that they were singling her out for this special treatment because she’s in a wheelchair,” he told Fox News. “They are specifically singling out disabled people for this special scrutiny. It’s rather offensive to me as a father of a disabled child.”
The agent said they needed to pat down Lucy and swab her wheelchair – even though both had already gone through the checkpoint.
Forck’s wife started filming the entire episode – over the objections of the TSA agent.
“You can’t do touch my daughter unless I record it,” she can be heard telling the agent.
The agent replied by telling the parents “It is illegal to do that.”
