The Secret Service Agent and the Airline

ON CHRISTMAS DAY, Wallid Shatter, an Arab-American member of President Bush’s Secret Service detail, was ordered off American Airlines Flight 363 from Baltimore to Dallas. He was on his way to join the president at his Crawford, Texas, ranch.

According to the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which has lodged a complaint with American Airlines, Shatter had already gone through the paperwork required of armed federal agents. It was the flight’s captain who first raised concerns about him. Then, according to CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper, “when the agent asked to go back on the plane to retrieve his jacket, the captain said, ‘I don’t want him back on that plane.'” The flight was delayed 75 minutes, and took off without Shatter.