Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
At today’s Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing, journalist Matt Taibbi laid bare the full absurdity of the Transportation Security Administration’s Quiet Skies program.
What he described was not a serious counterterrorism tool, but a sprawling surveillance dragnet that trampled civil liberties, burned through taxpayer money, and delivered nothing in return.
It’s long past time for this program — and anything that remotely resembles it — to be permanently dismantled.
Table of contents
No Results, Only Abuses
As Taibbi testified, the TSA spent $200 million a year monitoring as many as 50 people a day under Quiet Skies.
Yet in the entire history of the program, it never led to a single arrest or prevented a terrorist attack.
Instead, it created a culture of surveillance for its own sake. “This is what our government does now,” Taibbi said. “It gathers information on its own citizens as an end in itself.”
One striking case involved former Hawaii congresswoman and combat veteran Tulsi Gabbard, who, as Taibbi reported, was placed under surveillance that included bomb-sniffing dogs and teams of three Federal Air Marshals shadowing her on domestic flights.
The TSA stonewalled when asked for justification, insisting that “matching to a risk-based rule does not constitute derogatory information.”
In other words: being flagged doesn’t mean you did anything wrong — but we’ll treat you like a suspect anyway.
Political Weaponization
Sen. Rand Paul, chairing the hearing, underscored how Quiet Skies went beyond waste and ineffectiveness into outright political targeting.
Records revealed that Tulsi Gabbard was surveilled on at least five domestic flights — despite her known identity as a sitting public figure.
“If this can happen to a combat veteran, a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve, and now Director of National Intelligence,” Paul said, “it can happen to anyone.”
It wasn’t just Gabbard. According to documents released in Paul’s investigation, Quiet Skies was used to target Americans for First Amendment-protected activities.
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A Catholic schoolteacher from Texas was watch-listed as a “domestic terrorist” merely for attending Trump’s January 6th rally — even though location data and facial recognition confirmed she never entered the Capitol.
Other Americans were flagged for removing masks on airplanes during COVID mandates. Incredibly, three sitting Republican members of Congress were also swept into the related “Silent Partner” program.
This is not counterterrorism. This is the weaponization of federal resources to chill dissent and punish political opposition.
A Culture of Unchecked Surveillance
The larger problem is that Quiet Skies is not an isolated case but part of a post-9/11 drift toward normalizing warrantless mass surveillance.
Taibbi reminded senators of James Clapper’s infamous “least untruthful” answer to Congress about NSA data collection — a moment that confirmed lying about domestic spying carries no penalty.
Once the government starts collecting data on innocent citizens (especially 2A supporters), it creates a perpetual justification to do it again and again.
One Federal Air Marshal put it plainly to Taibbi: “The air marshal’s job is to protect the cockpit and the pilots. Let somebody else do the intelligence.”
Instead, marshals trained for critical security missions were conscripted into following ordinary Americans around airports, clipboard in hand.
Shut the Door, Don’t Just Change the Name
Biden’s TSA Administrator Pekoske and his cronies abused their authority and weaponized the federal government against the very people they were charged with protecting.
— Secretary Kristi Noem (@Sec_Noem) September 30, 2025
Biden’s TSA wildly abused their authority, targeting Americans who posed no aviation security risk under the…
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has announced the termination of Quiet Skies, but as Paul warned, that is not enough.
“We must make sure that this program does not come back under another name,” he said. Programs built on secrecy, vague authorities, and political bias will always be tempted to resurface.
Ending Quiet Skies must be paired with accountability. Every official who directed surveillance of Americans for political or expressive activity should be removed from office.
Transparency should be the default — not something won through years of congressional inquiry.
Conclusion
The Quiet Skies program epitomized what happens when security agencies abandon the distinction between “bad thoughts” and “bad acts.” It drained public resources, violated core constitutional rights, and undermined trust in the very institutions meant to protect us.
As Taibbi told the committee: “It’s time to stop being numb to this outrage.” Eliminating Quiet Skies must be the beginning of reform, not the end.
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Tulsi Gabbard is a Russian asset and should be surveilled closely, regardless of this stupid program.
You are a fool.
TulsiGabbard has repeatedly suggested that the U.S. and NATO are to blame for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
In 2022, she stated that the war could have been “easily avoided” if NATO had acknowledged Russia’s “legitimate security concerns”.
Her comments echoed Kremlin talking points, leading to criticism from lawmakers, including Republican Senator Mitt Romney, who accused her of “parroting false Russian propaganda.
This material is from an AI google search.
After WWII the CIA was established in 1947 to succeed the OSS, after all, the OSS was inundated with Communists. The main rationale behind creating an intelligence service was to prevent another surprise attack such as what occurred December 7, 1941. Of course, many Americans both now and then do NOT believe that FDR was unaware since the Japanese Naval and diplomatic codes were very likely cracked well before Midway. Since 1947 there are many important points in history that seem to indict the CIA and suggest this intel organization has NOT met the establishment’s charter. Here are just a few that come to mind, it’s important to keep in mind that the CIA’s objectives are so complex and hidden that determining a failure from a success is impossible for outsiders.
The CIA initially backed Castro financially to overthrow Batista. The CIA failed at the Bay of Piggs and was very well matched by Castro and his spies including the failed operation Mongoose and for many US administrations onward.
The CIA, protecting the British oil sources, participated in a coup of Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh and placed the Shah in power. Hardly the beacon of democracy.
The CIA was involved in establishing the counterculture with drugs such as LSD and has been linked to the drug scourges of today tracing back to the 1950’s through the massive crimes of MKULTRA until today where TRUMP is likely the only POTUS that ever showed a desire to stop the flow of illegal drugs into US.
Despite JFK’s wishes, the CIA backed the assassination of Diem in 1963 and led to a more likely war in Viet Nam.
The insane operation Northwoods was prevented by JFK.
The CIA supposedly was unaware of a successful plot to assassinate JFK.
The CIA’s Phoenix Program was a criminal enterprise.
The CIA was as surprised as my next-door neighbor’s goldfish when the USSR collapsed in 1991. Kind of a big deal.
Despite all those risky investments prior to 9/11 (short sales etc on US airlines and the supporting re-insurance companies that would have netted millions) the CIA supposedly missed the breadcrumbs that drove war machined for decaes.
With all the mega data it’s understandable how the CIA missed October 7 but the Mossad is a little hard sell for incompetence.
“Splinter the CIA into a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds” -JFK
and yet illegals from all over the world can walk around with full immunity….makes one wonder who is actually pulling the strings over the democratic party…….
Agreed, the citizens being treated as 2nd class to illegals.