Customs and Border Protection Proposed Amended Rule Deputizes Foreign Nationals

Surveilling Americans for More than 20 Years

By Thomas DeVere Wolsey

The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Customs and Border Protection (CBP) unit have proposed onerous new regulations that will not improve security in any substantive manner and will increase the probability of abuse by CBP and its sister agencies, such as the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). See: https://www.regulations.gov/document/USCBP-2023-0002-0001 These rule changes include a requirement that all travelers arriving in the United States (US) or traveling from the US will provide:

· A U.S. address

· Two phone numbers

· An email address

On a recent trip to the United States from Europe, I was denied a seat assignment until I presented my driver’s license and went through a secondary screening at the request of an automated response from TSA, according to airline employees. A mother was separated from her young children, and another from her husband in this same dragnet. In my case, I was denied the rewards of travel such as preferred boarding and my travel miles. Moreover, I was left with a seat at the back of the plane near the lavatories with only left-over food to eat because no choices remained. CBP has effectively deputized foreign nationals (Non-US airline employees and their contractors) to carry out their CBP tasks on foreign soil.