Two congressional chairmen are sounding the alarm about reports of the Trump administration’s plans to send hundreds of Transportation Security Administration employees to the southern border just as air travel picks up for the summer.
In a letter to TSA, Rep. Elijah Cummings, the chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Reform, and Rep. Stephen Lynch, the chairman of the Subcommittee on National Security, expressed their concern about yanking TSA employees from their duties at airports and sending them to the southern border.
Doing so will “weaken aviation security and significantly increase the risks faced by the American people,” Cummings and Lynch wrote in the May 20 letter.
“An obvious and enormous problem with this plan is that TSA employees already have full-time jobs, and the agency needs them to fulfill their critical mission at our nation’s airports, as well as to address vulnerabilities identified by the Government Accountability Office and the Inspector General of the Department of Homeland Security,” the two wrote.
Citing a CNN report, Cummings and Lynch said the Trump administration plans to send TSA workers to help deal with the influx of migrants on the southern border, “just as the busy summer travel season begins.” Up to 175 law enforcement officials and as many as 400 people from security operations could be deployed, the CNN report said.