WASHINGTON (TNND) — Dozens of Americans who were either involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riots or refused to comply with COVID-19 mask mandates amid the pandemic were placed on watch lists and no-fly lists, which are reserved for suspected terrorists, by the Transportation Security Administration under the Biden administration.
An internal investigation by the Transparent Security Administration and its parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, reported by Fox News Digital, revealed the Biden administration's efforts to target Americans "who posed no aviation security risk under the banner of political differences," according to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.
Noem accused Biden and the TSA Administrator of "wildly" abusing their authority, and has referred the internal investigation to the Department of Justice and Congress.
"Biden’s TSA Administrator [David] Pekoske and his cronies abused their authority and weaponized the federal government against the very people they were charged with protecting," Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem wrote on X. "President Trump promised to end the weaponization of government against the American people, and we are making good on that promise."
Deeper in the article, it gets worse:
A total of 19 Americans were placed on watchlists, with more than half of them added to the no-fly list as a result of "Operation Freedom to Breathe." At least eleven of the individuals remained on watchlists under the national mask mandate ended in April 2022. ...
However, there are at least two individuals who were placed on the watchlist who weren't even present during the January 6 riots. Internal emails revealed that TSA relied on the George Washington University Program of Extremism academic database and social media instead of the FBI and police in determining who to put on watchlists. A federal air marshal's wife, who wasn't present at the Capitol that day, was added to a watch list, and a National Guardsman deployed to the Capitol for Biden's inauguration, also not present at the Capitol on Jan. 6, was placed on a no-fly list.
