United States Senator Rand Paul (R-Kent.) was detained by Transportation Security Administration personnel in Nashville this morning after refusing an invasive body search following a body scan.
Paul communications director Moira Bagley tweeted around 10 a.m., ET, “Just got a call from @senrandpaul. He’s currently being detained by TSA in Nashville.”
According to TSA personnel, they noticed an “anamoly” during a body scan of Paul as he attempted to meet his flight. He refused an invasive body search. After a standoff, Paul was forced to book a later flight and possibly miss 4:30 p.m. votes.
Libertarian National Campaign Committee Chairman Wayne Root wrote about the TSA in Nov. 2010, suggesting it be privatized to avoid violations of civil liberties such as Paul’s:
There are two simple solutions to this TSA mess. First and most importantly, hand airline security over to the private sector. Let airlines manage their own security, with their own private security forces. Get government out of the way. Government isn’t the solution, they are the problem.
We must put Delta, American, U.S. Air, Southwest and all the other airlines in charge of their own security — just like all other private sector companies. That puts incompetent bumbling order-takers, creeps and perverts, some of whom could be TSA agents, on the sidelines. By the way, I’m sure most TSA agents are good people. They are being placed in a bad position by government. They are forced to follow idiotic rules, or lose their jobs in the middle of a depression. If the truth be told, I actually feel sorry for many of these people placed in such a no-win situation.
Putting airline security in the hands of the airlines themselves, also ensures the usual private sector positive results. American business usually gets it right. Businesses will weigh the right amount of security versus customer privacy, civil rights, and satisfaction. And if they fail we as consumers can simply stop using that airline and choose another. The ones who get it right will succeed. The ones who don’t will fail. That’s called the power of free markets. Capitalism works. Perhaps the U.S. government should allow for it sometime.
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