TSA Office of Inspection Accountability Act of 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. HUDSON. I thank the gentleman for his work on this important piece of legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 4803, the TSA Office of Inspection Accountability Act of 2014. Again, I would like to commend the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Sanford) for developing this commonsense bill, which increases accountability within TSA and saves precious taxpayer dollars by requiring the agency to correctly designate criminal investigators within the Office of Inspection.

According to the Department of Homeland Security inspector general, TSA does not ensure that its criminal investigators in the Office of Inspection are meeting the Federal workload requirements for law enforcement officers, even though they are considered law enforcement officers and are receiving premium pay and other benefits.

If nothing is done to correct this problem, the misclassification will cost taxpayers roughly $17 million over the next 5 years. This type of waste is simply unacceptable.

As chairman of the Subcommittee on Transportation Security, I held a hearing on this topic and was both surprised and encouraged to hear the head of the Office of Inspection admit that his office would reduce the number of criminal investigator positions based on the office's workload.

Although an acknowledgement is a step in the right direction, TSA needs to go one step further. It is time for them to take real action on this issue and achieve tangible results, which is precisely what this legislation requires.

In addition to ensuring that the proper classification is placed on criminal investigators, the Committee on Homeland Security agreed to an amendment offered by the ranking member of the full committee, Mr. Thompson, that would require TSA to submit to Congress any materials associated with the Office of Inspection's review of the Federal firearms license by Federal Air Marshals Service officials to obtain discounted or free firearms for their own personal use, as well as specific actions that will be taken to prevent air marshals from exploiting their positions to obtain free or discounted firearms from vendors for their personal use.

I have been concerned with TSA's failure to notify Congress of the ongoing Office of Inspection investigations into potential unethical activity related to the acceptance of free and discounted firearms for personal use among FAMS employees, including senior officials.

I am pleased that this bill would ensure the committee receives access to information that is necessary to carry out its important oversight role, and I urge my colleagues to support the bill.

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Mr. HUDSON. Mr. Speaker, again, thank you to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Sanford) for this commonsense legislation. Also, I would like to thank the ranking member of the committee, Mr. Richmond, for not only his work on this bill, but in the way we have worked together to make a difference for the American people.

The American people sent us to Congress to get things done, to make their lives better, and to make sure we are scrutinizing every tax dollar that is spent here. I think this piece of legislation, as my colleague from Louisiana said, is a commonsense piece of legislation that does just that.

So I am proud to stand here in support of it. I am proud of the work that Mr. Sanford put into this bill, and I would urge my colleagues to vote for this piece of legislation.

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