Congress: Terrorists Could Spot Undercover Air Marshals

What do you expect when lawyers and bureaucrats run an operation…a set of policies that makes them feel good… but are not practical. The Federal Air Marshalls are front line defense for us. How about listening to their ideas instead of the lawyers?? Let get real and change this ASAP!

Why is this agency putting all their men in a few hotels? Shouldn’t they each be traveling under some ruse as businessmen and staying all over the place? I would feel safer when I travel for business if I knew some of the other guests were Air Marshals. Air Marshals are trained to kill suicidal terrorists with no back-up. I would love for there to be one around and see what happens to the next mugger going after lost travelers outside a hotel.
Who is this Don Strange guy? He sounds pretty sharp. I thought the story was all of the management was corrupt???

As a former TSA supervisor this is not a new problem. This has been going on since day one. The upper management’s failure to listen to the best security people (the Air Marshalls)about how procedures should be conducted verus how they will be conducted. A perfect example is their dress code, they do not blend in with the public they stick out like a sore thumb. And as zimmer stated nothing will be done until there is another 9/11. Welcome to Washington policy.

I feel much safer when I fly knowing that there are these highly trained Federal Marshal’s are on domestic flights. However the supervisor’s of these Air Marshal’s should be terminated and they should provide active Air Marshal’s a chance to become supervisors. Who would know better how to run the agency than the one’s who actively fly everyday.

Have any of the Air Marshal managers seen United 93? Do they even know why they are there? Maybe someone needs to let them talk to some of the flight 93 crew’s family members so they can get a reality check. Do your jobs right men.

Ridiculous. As a former police officer, I know that any moderately competent department could do better. Dress should be designed to vary appearance while providing cover for weapons. Random pattern hotels, travel separately, and no public ID checks. TSA screening points should include “Quality Control” observers charged only with detecting individuals watching screenings attempting to identify marshalls.

Air Marshals are NOT undercover agents. We have been told that repeatedly by management in our particular office. It has been explained to us that by operating in a “high-profile” rather than covert status it serves as a deterent to terrorists as well as a comfort for the traveling public. Existing policies clearly enforce this view. The initial ramp up of the air marshal program after the attacks of September 11th 2001 did focus on covert operations with the primary mission being to prevent commercial aircraft from being overtaken and used as weapons once again. After the agency was taken over by former Secret Service officers the primary mission was altered to produce political results rather than actually focusing on the prevention of hijackings. Current management continues to belittle the Air Marshals, betray the nation and focus on non-essential areas instead of aviation security. It is an incredible shame that many good people have been run away from an essential, but poorly run agency.

Good ol republicans, they like to boast what they can do, they like to look in-charge, they like to start progams to make people happy, only problem is that they don’t know how to run anything and they don’t fund it either. They just want your vote and then want you to go back to sleep.

My father would roll over in his grave, as a man who placed a high value on common sense. Why don’t they just have them sit in a designated seat, with a sign above that says, “Air Marshal.” In case of an attempted hijacking, the terrorists will simply take them out first. How ludicrous.

I remember when the program first started I was flying back from Washington DC to Minneapolis. We had Air Marshals on our plane. It was obvious. The ticket people kept asking the guy questions and you could see him getting madder and madder. Great undercover. He had to explain why he didn’t have a ticket and why he had to board ahead of time. And he had to do it in front of the entire group of board and curious passengers.

What insanity! No wonder we cannot protect this country or it’s citizens! I’d like to have a one on one with whomever is in charge of the Air Marshal program. Charles L. Bloss, Jr., Deputy Sheriff (Ret.)

Could it be that the terrorists are really running the organization?

Airline security in the US should stop political correctness and learn with and do just as the most successful country when it comes to preventing those types of attacks, namely Israel. Stop hypocrisy and incompetency and put the best practices in action. Period.

Please stop censoring my posts.
Yes, the general public can easily spot us a mile away. I’d like to give you a heads up of how to spot FAMS senior management. Look for the closest resemblance to the out of shape “DITECH.com” guy loser. You will see these squirrely,fuddy-duddy cowards who talk a bunch of junk (hide behind their positions) to the operators in the field who would love to get them in the mat room for a little sparring session, but their too busy wasting tax payers dollars organizing golf outings(kiss the bosses butt sessions) on government computers.

What about the QUALITY OF LIFE? The LACK OF FAMILY TIME. We were recently told that we CANNOT use Leave under the FAMILY LEAVE ACT to care for our sick or injured children, if we are married. “OUR JOBS”, CONCERN NATIONAL SECURITY. Therefore our SPOUSES MUST TAKE CARE OF THEM.
What about being FORCED to work on our DAYS OFF, WITH NO PAY. We are already gone usually four days and nights of the week, away from our families due to the overnights.
What about the statisics FAMS Management is showing congress. That we only spend 4Hrs. in the air. And only work 8 Hrs. a day.
More like 7-8 Hrs. in the air, and 10-12 Hrs. scheduled work days.
Hotel lists grouping us all together. What other Federal Agency forces their employees to stay at MANDATED HOTELS?
We were threatened with termination, or criminal charges using the patriot act, if we went public or contacted our congressmen concerning anything negative about our agency.

i am a mom of a great man that is a marshall i am afraid every time my son goes out. you never know if there is a bad guy on the plain
these marshall work long hours and haveto drive so far to get to their flights.by the time they get off the plain and drive a n hour or so to get home the kis are asleep and the wif is to tired to talk. please try to fix these things shorter flights or take off closer to home . a conserned mom

It is shameful that former Secret Service and FBI management would so deliberately jeopardize the safety of American Citizens and National Security just to fill their own pockets with green. Nothing less than their immediate firing will serve as justice for their foul deeds. . I have had the pleasure to know several Federal Agents in my day (US Marshals, ATF Agents FBI Agents etc) and I’ve found no group of people who are more wary of the Federal Government than they. To a man, all I have met are strong gun right supporters and bear tremendous distrust of the Government and its power. Stories such as this illustrate why the American public is losing faith in their government. It is exactly these types of thugs that make Lawyers, The ACLU and Unions necessary evils.
If there is another September 11 style attack on aircraft, after we have spent so many billions of dollars, who is going to fly?
When the airlines go bankrupt, forget recession, we will be in a depression. Perhaps that is the Bush administrations answer toward Border Security and unchecked Immigration, create an economy of fat cats and poor that’s actually worse than Mexico.

Nothing has changed, I see. As one of the original FAM’s in 1970, when the perceived threat was hijacking to CUBA, we faced many of these same dilemmas. Our dress codes and haircuts weren’t as strictly specified, but we were very easily identified by the flying public. We were the first to board and always seated on the aisle against the bulkhead at the rear of a section. We were the first to charge to the lounge (remember when there was a cocktail lounge upstairs on a 747?), and hung out there all flight drinking tomato juice. We stayed in airline crew hotels and traveled to and from there on airline crew buses.
And we worked far more hours than back at our standard post of duty. I was ATF, on tdy to the US Marshal Service for FAM duty. During those days, we received premium pay for “irregular, unscheduled overtime.” However, the overtime hours required of us as FAM’s was ruled by a Federal court to be “scheduled” in a class action suit, resulting in back pay awards to participants in this action.

As a soon to be “ex-FAM”, I just want to apologize to the American public for our country’s failure to learn from it’s mistakes. I have spent the last 4 plus years trying to change the mind set of the management in my office, but have received nothing but a headache and indigestion! I will be leaving in a few weeks and taking a $25,000 pay cut to do so.
I refused to allow this agency to force me into feeling “stuck” in my career path. I am a 15 year law enforcement professional. This was my first stint with the federal government and it will be my LAST! The US Government is supposedly this great “Super-Power”… boy is that scary! If we are, then I would like to see how screwed up Germany, France, Russia and China are!
Unfortunately, there is no one in the FAM Service management who is able to keep their ego in check. They refuse to look outside the box. They refuse to value the “Flying FAM’s” opinion regarding a job they do on a daily basis.
As per the FAM official statement, we are highly trained, highly dedicated and willing protector’s of our nations’ skies. However, we are like a boxer who has been sent into the ring to fight Mike Tyson with both our hands and our legs tied behind our backs. All the training and dedication in the world cannot help us do our jobs if we are working under these conditions.
God bless each and every FAM and their families. I hope the job changes for the better, before it is too late.

First of all, THANK YOU to all of the flying FAMs out there for a job well done under the worst of circumstances. Hopefully the attention that has and will be brought to these issues will help you all in the long run, but I’m afraid it’s still going to be a long road. Maybe they should just give you all uniforms and MP-5′s and have you sit in the jump seats at the front of the planes. How would the public feel about that one? If there’s someone out there that can help, PLEASE HELP US!

“Mom” makes a good point on here: these new FAMs are going to places like New York, where they can’t afford to live. So in addition to their scheduled 12 hour day, they have to drive an hour and a half to 2 hours each way, coming and going to work just so they can afford to live. The bosses will chew your ass and tell you that it hurts your family to live so far away- well shit, it would also hurt your family to live in a cardboard box (cause that’s all you’ll get within an hour of JFK or LGA on a rookie FAM’s pay). So they’re starting their day after a 2 hour drive, and then supposed to stay awake and alert as that pressurized plane takes off and everyone else around them snoozes. Meanwhile, they got 4 year FAMs making six figures, living it up in Charlotte and Atlanta with their mansions, Escalades, and sports cars. I realize that rank has its privileges, but this is pretty extreme.

Without giving out too much info, I am a female FAM. In the past week I flew 5 flights while wearing jeans and sitting in the middle of the plane. No one had an inkling as to who I was with the exception of the FFDO’s and other armed LEO’s flying. If the big wigs watching me (FAMs) in the airport couldn’t pick me out of the crowd then they can’t rat me out either, get it? Great jobs guys and gals!

I too am a former Federal Air Marshal and am one of the first to have been hired after the horror of 9/11. I am very proud of Spencer Pickard a fellow patriot and brother in arms. Everything he said is absolutely true. In reality this five minute segment only revealed the very tip of the iceberg.
I am very glad to have seen the response to this very dangerous issue by other Air Marshals, Airline Employees, and our general traveling public. Their comments and insights are also true.
I too felt forced to resign from the agency because I knew I could no longer protect the American public from harm, due to the incredibly negligent, counterproductive, dangerous, and illegal policies set by Tom Quinn, his predecessor and the entire upper management of the Federal Air Marshal Service.
I have spent a year of my life writing a book regarding all of these issues brought to light tonight and many more. It was the only way I felt I could protect the citizens of our country. My book is now being edited and will be released to the public soon. If you are interested in this issue and would like to know just how deep the rabbit hole really is, look for “Inside The Federal Air Marshal Service, The Public At Risk”.
I am not using this forum to promote my book I am just sharing further information. My book will sell because it contains the truth and it is something the American people need to know for their own sakes and the sakes of their loved ones.
Due to this agencies absolute refusal to properly do their jobs they are in fact putting your life, your family’s lives, and the lives of the Air Marshals in danger every day.
I have spoken to Tom Quinn on three occasions, brought these issues to his attention and was basically told to keep my mouth shut. My supervisors offered no help. There was no were else to turn except to the American public, as Spencer has done.
We need your help. Tom Quinn and his managers have lied to Congress, Senators, and any reporter who has questioned them. This failure goes all the way to the top of the Department of Homeland Security. As stated earlier, all of the upper managers are friends and former USSS supervisors. They have compiled failure after failure regarding the safety of the tax paying public who pays them so handsomely.
This is not a Republican or Democratic issue or political blame game. I do not think anyone outside the close knit group of former USSS buddies really knows the truth.
I hope you support Spencer Pickard for his valor and demand these managers’ jobs. They have failed you, me, and every Air Marshal who continues to do their best even though they have been critically crippled by the current polices.

This is exacly what happens when you take the Old Guard Secret Service Post Standing Mentality and attempt to bridge over these outdated concepts to the Air Marshal Program. People like Tom Quinn are more concerned with image than substance and effectiveness the classic empty suit syndrome that has plagued other agencies. The worst part of all is not only when you check in at the gate you need to identify yourselves, many times prior to boarding the will call you by your name to pre-board. Great Operational Security No? The bottom line is that this program needs to be revamped and the Hairbags in DC need to stop double dipping and retire.

This is standard operating hierachial BS procedure.
Policies are made by desk jockies & the guys on the front line are not listened to due to lower rank & the NIH (Not Invented Here) attitude.
Its typical. Next, they’ll probably weed-out & punish anyone who talks about the weaknesses.

Thank You! ThankYou! to Don Strange and the US Air MArshall who spoke up regarding the things that the Air Marshall’s are going through. It seems to me that we have a bunch of idiot’s running this department. I think that the people who make the orders and simple minded rules for the Air Marshall’s should spend a month doing what they do and putting themselves at risk, this way, their mothers can see how it feels to be worried sick everyday. I am the mother of an Air Marshall and I have know all of this for some time. Thank God it is out in the open!!!! Thank You ABC News!!!!!
Terry D.

What a hero the (soon to be unemployed)fam appearing on 20/20 is to the active fams! The active fams have needed a voice for a very, very long time, but, in fear of losing their jobs, they can’t speak out. FAM management which consists of retired secret service, double dippers (drawing retirement, AND a generous salary for doing their FAM “management”, (or mis-management) jobs should ALL be fired, and REPLACED with FAMs that KNOW what it is like to ACTUALLY perform the job. The job, being providing safety. Now that this young man has thrown his FAM career away – WON’T SOME OF YOU WASHINGTON POLITICIANS LISTEN???? Revamp the Air Marshal Service!!!! NOW!!!! PLEASE, let’s don’t just go through the motions to look like we’re secure, when we’re not – until we have another 9/11. Upper management KNOWS it could happen again anytime. They just want to draw their big retirement checks from secret service, AND their new BIG salaries from the air marshal service (the double-dippers)!!! Let’s get this thing under control. ASK THE ACTIVE, FLYING, FAMS how things could be run better. THEY are the ones that can tell you – not the idiots (yes – IDIOTS) that sit in the mangement chairs and play on their government computers while they collect their big checks. Let the REAL FAMS run the organization – and then the flying public will be safe. You’re my hero, Spencer Pickard! Let’s just hope that we can get more politicians like Jim “Sense”nbrenner to take a look at how incredibly awful the air marshal service is currently being run – and initiate some REAL change. Let’s get rid of all of the double dippers – we can save so much taxpayer money right off the bat. Next, we close some of the regional offices – these FAMS can fly out of ANY airport near their home. We actually cover so few flights anyway, and right now with the stupid rules of dress they have to follow – we know exactly who they are anyway. There are so many ways to run this agency BETTER. LET’S IMPLEMENT THE CHANGE!!!!

And there’s more: Want to identify the Marshall’s on your next flight? Start taking pictures of everyone in the departure lounge (and of the departure gate. If there are Marshalls present, they will immediately step up and prevent you from continuing.

To ABC News: Thank you for showing this program on the FAM Service. I have been a Flying FAM for 4+ years now and everything you showed is absolutely true. Bravo to your camera team who showed not only how easy it is to spot and identify us, but also showed how often we have to identify ourselves in direct view of the public. We have been asking, begging and pleading for changes in our procedures, to no avail. I can’t wait for the Congressional Report to be released. The FAM management has refused to answer our (flying FAMs) questions and requests. I hope Congress can get some answers out of them. How about asking how the FAM Service has managed to lose between 1,000 to 2,000 Air Marshals in the last three years? And how the remaining Marshals are forced to fly more flights so that the numbers don’t dip (#’s of flights covered)?

Sorry everyone, but I am finally quitting. I loved the job and mission, but hate the Secret Service corruption. I need to be able to respect myself again.
Our office is so bad that guys have warned our own management about the chance for violence. Guys routinely wear their weapons around the office on training days to defend themselves/escape the building once someone finally snaps. The jokes about going postal are not just jokes to blow off tension. It is a dangerous place to work as people are far too stressed and angered by the malfeasance.
Management does not care. They just continue the abuses.

I sincerely hope that heads will roll over this, but….I am not optimistic.
This sort of paraochial management, with de facto mafias guarding fiefdoms, exists elsewhere in the Federal government, as well.
If you purge the upper ranks of the FAMS, then where else might the axe fall?
We will see a circling of the wagons, perhaps a sacrificial firing of two or three guys, then the attention of Congress and the public will move on, as the event horizon of the news media churns.
Then, there will be subtle forms of payback instituted against those who dared to break ranks and speak out.
The horrible irony is, these narrowminded, overly-regimented buffoons who are running TSA and OTHER Federal agencies have no inkling that they exhibit what amounts to a form of corruption.
Or worse, they know it, and they do not care. They have gotten away with it for so many years and decades, and in fact, they grew up in institutional cultures that produced them. They will just wait it out.
You want to see more of the same arrogance and incompetence? Look at the FBI. They are a standing joke in law enforcement circles.
Seriously.
God Bless the whistleblowers.
May God Save the Republic.

After 20 years in the military, I went to work for the Bureau Of Prisons (BOP). A little while back I was talking with a former SS fellow who had nothing but contempt for the BOP. This is what I told him:
The BOP is the only sucessful agency outside the military in the government. Whenever there is an attempt on a “Principal” they are hit by at least one bullet. Good job when that grenade was found in the crowd last year. Secret Service, failed. Drugs are rampant everywhere in our country. Go 1-2 blocks away and get some crack cocaine. DEA, failed. Go a few blocks away and purchase some guns on the street. ATF, failed. Can’t find suspects unless someone rolls over on them and try to plea bargain. FBI and DOJ, failed. Oh yeah, I guess Border Patrol is doing a great job. Nope, 12 million illegals. Customs isn’t so great either. How do you think everything gets in the country? BOP is told to lock these folks up. The BOP says OK and it’s done. What some folks say is an escape is really a “walk away” from a little camp. Sometimes there is a failure, but very rarely. The FAM Service could make it the premier agency in government, but I don’t see any BOP folks at the top. Just a thought.

Then why not have two marshalls. one posted as offical for all the public to see, and have yet another undercover marshall unbenounced. What’s so wrong W/ a lil’ back up, and don’t tell me we couldn’t afford it. I know I’m just a knownothing lower class civilian, but I’d a hoped we would be a little more further along in our national defence practices.