The Trump administration has blown the lid off a potential TSA corruption scandal that could expose how the Biden administration protected politically connected Democrats while targeting their opponents with invasive surveillance.
The Department of Homeland Security revealed Wednesday that Sen. Jeanne Shaheen’s husband, William “Billy” Shaheen, “traveled with a known or suspected terrorist three times in a single year” and was added to a terror watchlist… but received special VIP treatment after the New Hampshire Democrat “directly lobbied” former TSA administrator David Pekoske to have her husband removed from the list.
The Biden administration’s “inconsistent application of Silent Partners Quiet Skies and watchlisting programs” circumvented security policies “to benefit politically aligned friends and family at the expense of the American people,” critics said the DHS evidence shows.
While Billy Shaheen was getting royal treatment despite his terrorist connections, Trump’s Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and countless other Americans were placed on the intrusive surveillance list “with little to no visibility, awareness, explanation or oversight.”
The contrast couldn’t be more stark or more damning for the Biden administration’s politicized approach to national security.
According to the DHS timeline, Billy Shaheen was first flagged as a “Co-Traveler with a Known or Suspected Terrorist” on July 20, 2023, during flights from Boston Logan International Airport to Washington-Reagan International Airport and back through Dulles. He was subjected to enhanced TSA screening that he later described in graphic terms.
“I didn’t ask to be removed,” William Shaheen told News 9. “So why was I on this thing? Because every time I went to an airport, they would frisk me, but more than just frisk me. I mean, they had their hand up my crotch and every place else.”
Rather than accepting that her husband’s association with suspected terrorists warranted additional security scrutiny, Sen. Shaheen immediately began working the system. Her office “made an inquiry to TSA about the senator’s husband receiving enhanced screening on these two flights,” according to DHS.
When Billy Shaheen was flagged again on October 18, 2023, for a second time as a co-traveler with the same known or suspected terrorist, Sen. Shaheen escalated her lobbying campaign and “met with Pekoske about her husband being on a watchlist.”
The results were swift and stunning. Just two days later, on October 20, 2023, Nancy Nykamp, then-assistant administrator for intelligence and analysis, approved Billy Shaheen for the “Secure Flight Exclusion List” – effectively giving him VIP status that exempted him from “any future TSA Random Selectee designation, and Rules-based Selectee designation, such as Quiet Skies, Association Based Rule Selectee designation, or Silent Partner Selectee designation.”
This wasn’t just preferential treatment – it was a complete exemption from the security protocols designed to protect American travelers from potential terrorist threats.
“Pekoske granted Billy Shaheen a blanket Silent Partners Quiet Skies exemption despite Shaheen flying with a Known or Suspected Terrorist on three occasions,” DHS revealed. “All the while, Tulsi Gabbard, and many other Americans, were placed on the Silent Partners’ Quiet Skies list with little to no visibility, awareness, explanation or oversight.”
The hypocrisy is breathtaking. While Gabbard – a military veteran and former presidential candidate – was subjected to invasive surveillance for criticizing the Biden administration’s weaponization of federal agencies, a Democrat senator’s husband was getting special exemptions despite documented associations with suspected terrorists.
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem didn’t mince words about the new scandal.
“It is clear that this program was used as a political rolodex of the Biden Administration – weaponized against its political foes and to benefit their well-heeled friends. This program should have been about the equal application of security, instead it was corrupted to be about political targeting. The Trump Administration will restore the integrity, privacy, and equal application of the law for all Americans, including aviation screening,” Noem said.
According to the Trump administration, Billy Shaheen “was hardly the only high-profile individual that was placed on this exclusion list,” which allegedly included “members of foreign royal families, political elites, professional athletes, and journalists.”
Meanwhile, the Quiet Skies program – which began in 2010 to monitor travelers who may pose elevated security risks – may have been used to harass political opponents. Air marshals are tasked with observing targets and documenting “whether they change clothes or shave while traveling, abruptly change direction while moving through the airport, sweat, tremble or blink rapidly during the flight, use their phones, talk to other travelers or use the bathroom, among many other behaviors.”
Gabbard found herself subjected to surveillance last summer shortly after criticizing Joe Biden and Kamala Harris for weaponizing the federal government – which could prove her point about political targeting in the most ironic way possible.
Now both Shaheens are scrambling to control the fallout. William Shaheen, described by CBS News as “a Lebanese-American attorney active in the Arab-American community,” claims he did nothing wrong despite the documented terrorist associations.
“I have not traveled with a terrorist or a known terrorist,” William Shaheen said. “I was the former U.S. attorney, a former judge, a former captain in the Army, and for them to say, in some way, I was involved with a terrorist is delusional.”
Sen. Shaheen’s office also pushed back on the scandal.
“Senator Shaheen contacted the Transportation Security Administration after her husband was subjected to several extensive, invasive and degrading searches at airport checkpoints. Senator Shaheen sought to understand the nature and cause of these searches. Any suggestion that the senator’s husband was supposedly included on a Quiet Skies list is news to her and had never been raised before yesterday, nor was she aware of any action taken following her call to remove him from such a list,” a spokesperson said.
The idea that a sitting U.S. Senator – the top Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, no less – contacted the TSA administrator about her husband’s screening but somehow had no idea he was on a watchlist or that her lobbying resulted in his removal strains credibility, critics have said.
But William Shaheen suggested the whole thing was politically motivated, and said that he was traveling with “another attorney who the senator’s team saw was Arab American” and that “the whole thing feels political.”
William Shaheen enjoyed his VIP status for 18 months until current TSA leadership finally removed him from the exclusion list. Nancy Nykamp, who approved his special treatment, departed TSA in March 2025 as the new administration began cleaning house.