Lawmakers in the House are introducing a bill that will drastically change the way the TSA conducts screenings.
On Tuesday morning, Rep. Kathleen Rice, D-N.Y., responding to cries of discrimination, said her bill will end the public humiliation specifically suffered by transgender passengers.
The current screening protocol, Rice said, requires TSA officers to identify passengers as either male or female. Consequently, Rice’s office said in a press release, “transgender passengers are often flagged as ‘anomalies’ if they trigger an alarm, and could potentially be “outed” as transgender before being required to undergo additional screening. This has led to several reported incidents of public humiliation, discrimination and harassment.”
Under the “Screening with Dignity Act,” the TSA would be required to develop new procedures for interacting with transgender passengers within 60 days. This means taking into consideration “the particular needs of persons whose gender identity is different or is perceived to be different from their assigned sex at birth and the particular impact of screening on transgender passengers as opposed to the general population of passengers,” the bill reads.
Furthermore, TSA will be required to conduct a study on retrofitting airport screeners with new equipment or procedures that are gender neutral. They must then conduct another study on the impact TSAs screening has on transgender passengers as opposed to the general population.
The bill has 15 original cosponsors and has been endorsed by the National Center for Transgender Equality, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Human Rights Campaign, the Transgender Law Center, and the National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund.
