


A Democratic senator lobbied the Biden administration to remove her husband from a Transportation Security Administration surveillance program after flying with a suspected terrorist, according to the Trump administration.
The Department of Homeland Security revealed Wednesday morning that Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) contacted TSA about her husband, William “Billy” Shaheen, being subjected to enhanced screening and lobbied former TSA Administrator David Pekoske to give him a blank exemption from its Silent Partner and Quiet Skies program.
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Jeanna Shaheen first contacted the TSA in July 2023 after her husband was flagged for the enhanced screening during two flights, where he was flagged for the first time for traveling with a suspected or known terrorist.
The exemption, which Shaheen’s husband was given in October 2023, was given two days after the Democratic senator contacted the TSA for a second time after Billy Shaheen was flagged for traveling with a known or suspected terrorist.
“It is clear that this program was used as a political rolodex of the Biden Administration — weaponized against its political foes and to benefit their well-heeled friends,” DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said in a statement. “This program should have been about the equal application of security, instead it was corrupted to be about political targeting. The Trump Administration will restore the integrity, privacy, and equal application of the law for all Americans, including aviation screening.”
Other individuals who were followed by U.S. Marshals and monitored by the federal government while flying included foreign royal families, political elites, professional athletes, journalists, and the Trump administration’s Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard — all without knowing they were on a surveillance list rolled out by the Biden administration.
Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chairman Rand Paul (R-KY) exposed in May that the TSA had tracked Gabbard during the 2024 election for unspecified reasons that Republicans have said boiled down to politics.
In the Shaheens’ case, Mr. Shaheen was flagged by TSA on July 20, 2023, for traveling with a known or suspected terrorist, whose name was not included in the DHS announcement.
Not long after that flight, the senator’s office contacted the TSA about her husband receiving enhanced screening on two flights.
Mr. Shaheen was flagged a second time as a co-traveler of a suspected terrorist on Oct. 18, 2023. The DHS stated that the senator contacted TSA again and met with Pekoske.
Later that month, Mr. Shaheen was placed on the TSA’s Secure Flight Exclusion List, which ensures certain passengers are not surveilled. He remained on the list for 18 months, until April of this year.
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The DHS did not disclose the nature of Mr. Shaheen’s travel or why he was traveling with someone listed on the FBI’s terrorist watch list.
The senator’s office did not respond to a request for comment.