On the recordJune 5, 2013
And my colleagues, first I want to again thank Chairman Carter and Ranking Member Price for their excellent work, and again his staff. They have gone through some of the expenditures for TSA not only in the dollar amounts, but also in the language that's contained supporting their appropriations measures, some excellent provisions. Now, I do offer this amendment, which is no greater increase in spending, but does move some money around from TSA administration to support our private screening partnership program. As you heard earlier from one of the speakers, this program is very successful, it's cost effective, and many airports want to avail themselves of it. TSA has thwarted all the efforts to increase the private screening under Federal supervision, and they came up with a whole host of excuses. Also, they have cooked the books as far as the cost of operating these private screening operations. {time} 1600 Now, you've got to remember that if you look at this bill, it puts a limit of 46,000 screeners, I believe, in the past. We've increased that from 40,000. Mr. Rogers and I did that some time ago. Actually, if you go online, you'll find 51,000 screeners. We're not sure exactly what the figure is right now. It may be less than that. There are a total of 66,000 TSA employees. So that leaves approximately 15,000--even at our most conservative estimate--of the number of people in administration.…
