TSA Lies About The Constitution In Defending Pat Downs

from the shocker dept

A few weeks back, we noted some plans in Texas to make the TSA patdowns illegal. We were curious as to what would happen if the bill passed. And while it has been moving forward, the TSA put out a blog post recently claiming that the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution meant that states could not regulate federal agencies:

What's our take on the Texas House of Representatives voting to ban the current TSA pat-down? Well, the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution (Article. VI. Clause 2) prevents states from regulating the federal government.

Well, Boing Boing points us to an analysis of that claim, which suggests it's all kinds of wrong -- and wrong in a manner that suggests the anonymous TSA blogger knows it's wrong (i.e., the TSA is flat-out lying):

The problem here? The statement is false. Ignorance from the TSA is unlikely, so I’ll call a spade a spade. They’re lying.

The supremacy clause says nothing of the sort.

Of course, some of this may come down to interpretations of the Supremacy Clause, but it certainly appears that the TSA is stretching the definition (quite a bit) to pretend that it means no federal agency can be constrained by a state government. It seems pretty sad how frequently it appears our federal government is purposely misstating or misinterpreting the Constitution.

Filed Under: pat downs, supremacy clause, tsa