Alcee Hastings: “I have heard an alarming amount of discussion on this floor of the House today, suggesting that there may be something…”

“I have heard an alarming amount of discussion on this floor of the House today, suggesting that there may be something wrong with federalizing employees who have the responsibility to check luggage and screen passengers. I have been a Federal employee three times in my life, and each of those three times I felt a whole whale of a lot more secure than I did when I was a minimum-wage worker stripping celery. What federalization does is provide worker security, it provides better wages, it provides better health care, the same kind of health care that we have, and it enhances morale. All of us go through those checkpoints at airports and all of us are confronted with the same persons that had the responsibility on September 11 who, in many instances, are poorly trained, poorly paid, and their morale is at its lowest ebb on a continuing basis. At the very least we need to ensure that they are trained.”