A US senator is calling for a return to the requirement for passengers to remove their shoes.
Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-Il), a ranking member of the Commerce, Science and Transportation Subcommittee, said the US government should rescind former Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem’s policy that enables travelers to keep their shoes on at airport security screening checkpoints after the DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) found that the policy created a new security vulnerability in the system.
The Transportation Security Administration’s (TSA) standard policy that required all passengers to remove their shoes was implemented after the failed ‘shoe bomber’ terrorist attack in 2001, when a man successfully concealed an explosive in his shoe before boarding a flight. Had he been able to detonate the explosive on board, it would have killed all 197 passengers and the flight crew.
“Secretary Noem’s decision to implement a shoes-on policy on July 8, 2025, likely without meaningful consultation with TSA, was a reckless act,” said Duckworth in a letter to TSA. “The DHS Inspector General conducted covert testing that reportedly found certain TSA Advanced Imaging Technology full body scanners ‘can’t scan shoes’ – leading DHS OIG to determine ‘Noem’s policy move had inadvertently created a new security vulnerability in the system’.”
Duckworth’s demand comes after learning from the DHS OIG that DHS ignored and refused to address the concerns the OIG raised, the senator said in a statement posted on her official government website.
In her letter to TSA, Duckworth underscored how DHS’s inaction violates federal law, Office of Management and Budget (OMB) guidance and DHS’s own directives.
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