Alejandro Mayorkas
Secretary
Department of Homeland Security
David Pekoske
Administrator
Transportation Security Administration
Tirrell Stevenson
Director
Federal Air Marshal service
Secretary Mayorkas and Director Stevenson,
|lam writing to you today in reference to the forced deployments of Federal Air Marshals (FAMs)
to the southern border. It is known that these highly skilled FAMs are being made to perform mainly
non-law enforcement civilian humanitarian duties
There have been two major security incidents on aircraft within the past few weeks in which the
media has indicated there were no FAMS on board. ‘According to the Washington Post on November 11,
2022 3 man boarded a Frontier flight 1761 with two box cutters, The man threatened to stab the
passengers and crew and had to be subdued by other passengers. The flight was forced to divert and
‘the suspect was taken into custody,
Most recently, according to the Post, antother man was allowed to board Jet Blue flight 871 with
a small edged weapon. The suspect placed the edged weapon to the throat of at least one
passenger. He was later arrested and charged with several federal offenses. According to the Federal
Aviation Administration year to daté there have been 2,178 reports of unruly passengers, 767
investigations initiated, and 517 enforcement actions taken. Not to mention the fact there has been
‘two attempted attacks on our homelahd)since 9-11 during the holiday season.
Your policy of forcing FAMs to deployito the southern border is extremely concerning given the
time of year and the recent incidents of violence on American flagged aircraft. As it stands today, we
believe that many FAMS will refuse to deploy, believing the order is reckless and leaving our country
vulnerable to attack. In at jeast one ease, a FAM is being told he has to deploy even though he informed
‘the agency he has no child café.\The agencies only response has been that he will get written up and
face termination
Your policy ha8 resulted ima complete loss of confidence in Secretary Mayorkas, FAM Director
Stevenson, and Administrator Pekoske’s ability to lead DHS/TSA/FAMS. On behalf of our membership,
stop these dangerous and irresponsible deployments before our adversaries take advantage of the
opportunity this policy has provided
Dawid L onde
David Londo
President- Air Marshal National Council