Hell in this case being, where else, a commercial airplane. The story, in case you missed it, is in the Washington Post: “Passengers sue government over immigration authorities’ demand they produce ID before leaving flight.” http://wapo.st/2gzQine The nine plaintiffs are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union.

The government has now gone full-Nazi, a trend apparent since Donald Trump took office and began finding ways to strip Americans of their Constitutional rights. According to the story, way back in February two Customs and Border Protection agents blocked the jet way to an arriving aircraft and demanded identification documents from passengers trying to deplane. The crew had announced that showing government ID was required to deplane. Allegedly (presumption of innocence, or in this case truthfulness), passengers with the temerity to ask ‘why,’ were told it was “routine.” Ha! That’s a good one. Routine.

The routine is to be checked against various no-fly lists when you make a reservation and to be required to show ID at two stops en-route to the plane for its originating flight: once at the airline check-in counter and again at the TSA security checkpoint. If you skip the counter, because, say, you have no luggage and pre-printed your boarding pass, you still must show ID to pass security and board the plane. People who fly even somewhat regularly know this. The assertion that the pre-deplaning demand for ID was “routine” is pure … poppycock.

Not surprisingly, the Justice Department and CBP would not comment about the incident but said that the non-comment “should not be construed as agreement or stipulation with any of the allegations.” Of course not. Everybody knows that when the Trump-led government refuses to admit something is true despite being witnessed by dozens of people, it’s …. Let’s move on.

According to the Post, the suit seeks to bar the government from demanding ID before deplaning without a warrant or some other individualized reason to ask. The government apparently acknowledged later that it was looking for an ”immigrant” who was subject to a deportation order to leave the United States. The flight in question was from San Francisco to New York JFK Airport. As reported, an official with the Department of Homeland Security said after the incident,

“When we’re asked by our law enforcement partners to assist in searching for a person of interest, we are able to, and will, help” …. “This isn’t a new policy or related to any new executive order.”

Of course, the target of all this activity was not actually on the flight.

To be clear, the CBP agents in question were doing the job that management had given them. They cannot be expected to say “hey, this is stupid. We can get the answer another way and without drama.” So, let’s stay focused on the real issue.

The incident raises the question: why couldn’t the federal government, using information already in its systems arising from the original clearance and boarding of the plan, have determined whether the target was on the plane? If the government was unable to do this, a serious concern about the integrity of the security process that controls who may board an aircraft is raised. Perhaps this will be explored during the litigation that has ensued from this ham-handed “intervention.”

Another question also intrigues me, but we’ll never know the answer:  what would have happened if one or more the passengers had said,

OK, I’m not subjecting myself to this process, that I believe violates my rights, so I’ll just return to my seat. I will stay on this plane until I am allowed to leave without having to re-establish my identity. I have enough food and water to hole up here for several days! Where are we flying next?

Would the federal agents have repeated the scene from the recent United flight in which a passenger refused to deplane and give his seat to an airline employee and was then violently dragged off the plane? Or, would they applied common sense and checked the computer records to see if the target was on the plane? Speculation is invited.