ACLU attorney Reginald Shuford said the case is about individuals “who found out that their government considers them potential terrorists.” In addition to the delays and harassment they face when they attempt to board a flight, they “have no idea why they have been placed on the No-Fly list and no way to clear their names,” said Shuford. Even after obtaining letters from the TSA confirming their identity they continue to be stopped, searched, and interrogated.

In April 6 press conferences in Seattle, St. Louis, and Washington, D.C., the ACLU announced its decision to file suit against the Department of Homeland Security and the TSA. The plaintiffs in the suit include a master sergeant in the U.S Air Force; a 74-year-old retired Presbyterian minister; a coordinator for the American Friends Service Committee in Philadelphia; a student in Vermont, and three lawyers, two of whom are on the ACLU staff.

Plaintiff and civil liberties attorney David Fathi suspects the reason he is on the list is that his surname in Iranian. The harassment and interrogations occur not only when he attempts to board a flight, said Fathi, but he recently he was “threatened by customs officials with indefinite detention when trying to return home from vacation.”

The TSA denied the existence of such a list until November 2002, according to an ACLU press release, until shortly before the ACLU in northern California filed a Freedom of Information Act request on behalf of two local anti-war activists who were told they were on such a list. The lawsuit asks the court to declare that the no-fly list violates airline passengers’ constitutional right to freedom from unreasonable search and seizure and to due process under the Fourth and Fifth Amendments. It also asks the TSA to develop new guidelines to allow “innocent people to fly without being treated as potential terrorists.”

The TSA acknowledges it has received more than 250 complaints from airline passengers who suspect they are on the list, the Washington Post reported. The Post reported in January that the U.S. government was taking steps to require airlines and airline reservations companies to hand over all passenger records for scrutiny. The lists would be used to assign a numerical and color-coded score ranking the perceived threat the individual supposedly poses to airline safety. Since January 5, visitors from all but 27 countries, arriving at 115 airports and 14 seaports, have been required to submit to being photographed and fingerprinted in order to enter the United States.

The TSA maintains a “selectee” list along with the no-fly list. CNN reported April 6 that those on the selectee list must go through extensive screening before boarding, while those on the no-fly list “are not allowed to board a commercial aircraft.”  
 
 
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