While Democrats engaged in endless grandstanding aimed at depriving ICE and Border Patrol of funds, the weeks of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) shutdown and no paychecks drove over a thousand employees out of the Transportation Security Administration.
For two and a half months, Democrats held up DHS funding for almost all employees, and eventually only agreed to legislation excluding Customs and Border officers and immigration agencies’ civilian employees. That shutdown took a major toll on the TSA, which in turn impacts millions of Americans who travel through airports.
Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin posted on X, “Acting Deputy TSA Administrator Adam Stahl tells me the 76 day DHS shutdown resulted in 1,300+ TSA employees leaving the agency, adding that it takes 4-6 months to train new hires, and that it has ‘hamstrung our preparations’ for the FIFA World Cup this summer. DHS says they expect an influx of 5-7 million travelers to the US for the World Cup, which they say is the equivalent of hosting 78 Super Bowls spread throughout 11 American cities.”
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will have to continue assisting with the airport screening, but they also still lack adequate funding, as Dems insisted on excluding them from funding. And even new hires at TSA are already worried about shutdowns given there were multiple within the last eight months or so. In fact, Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), ranking member of the House Homeland Security Committee, has already threatened yet another shutdown for this year.
Asked on CNN last week if Democrats will start the whole rigmarole again in September when funding expires, Thompson replied, “There’s no question. In America, police shouldn’t wear masks while walking the streets. They need identification, they need cameras, and they need judicial warrants.” What Thompson did not address is that as of March there had been a 1347% increase in assaults on ICE and an 8000% increase in death threats against them. Furthermore, federal law explicitly gives immigration officers warrantless arrest powers.
Related: Bessent: Democrats Ensured Spirit Airlines’ Collapse
Democrats are absolutely destroying airline travel in this country, but they don’t care, because they assume they will always be able to travel no matter what. In fact, Thompson’s threat about another shutdown coincides with the abrupt folding of budget Spirit Airlines as the ultimate result of the Biden administration and Senate Democrats killing a merger between Spirit and Jet Blue. In fact, considering how Democrats have been demanding restrictions on airline travel with the excuse of “climate change” for years, it seems pretty clear that these elitist politicians are delighted if they can force more ordinary American citizens to stay home and not travel.
Whether Democrats are deliberately wrecking the airline industry and TSA or doing it through incompetence, the results are the same. “Not knowing when the next paycheck was going to come to pay for their child's child care, to put food on the table," Stahl told Melugin. "So the lack of job security continues to be an issue for our TSA personnel, particularly when we've experienced our third shutdown now within this fiscal year.” Democrats destroy everything with which they meddle.
