Sen. Bill Nelson wants to see tighter airport security.
The Democratic Florida lawmaker has filed legislation that will be discussed Wednesday and it would affect airports across the country. One of his ideas puts secret staffers inside of airports to run checks on security.
Nelson said in light of recent events, additional security should be a priority at airports.
"The recent downing of a Russian airliner over Egypt reminds us that our planes and airports remain targets for terrorists," Nelson said. "This bill would tighten internal security at airports across the country to help us better protect the traveling public from that type of attack."
Nelson filed the bill Monday along with the committee’s chairman, Republican Sen. John Thune of South Dakota.
The bill calls for the TSA to:
- Improve background checks on airport employees with access to secured areas by allowing TSA to access additional terrorism-related databases maintained by the intelligence community and conduct real-time, continuous criminal records checks through the FBI.
- Thoroughly review any threats from insiders at airports and report back to Congress on recommendations to improve security.
"Unbelievably for several months, guns were brought into the Atlanta airport by airport workers, were transferred to a passenger that had already gone through security, TSA security, and they were actually transported over a number of months from Atlanta to New York," Nelson said. "It was the lack of security on the perimeter of allowing workers into the airport proper that needs to be tightened up at all of our 300 airports."
So far, Nelson said only two airports, Orlando and Miami, have already started passenger-like screening on all employees to review internal security procedures
The bill now heads to the Senate Commerce Committee, where it is expected to be addressed later today.