In July 2025, we saw former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem implement one of the biggest policy changes we’ve seen at the TSA in years. With this, travelers no longer have to take off their shoes at TSA checkpoints.
Obviously travelers are generally in favor of an easier security screening process, but that ignores the other side of the equation — does this policy pose any potential safety concerns? There’s an interesting demand, on that front…
Senator Duckworth demands reversal of TSA policy
With Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem having recently been fired (“reassigned” to another “very important job”), Tammy Duckworth, a Democratic Senator from Illinois, is making a demand. She has written to Nguyen McNeil, Senior Official Performing the Duties of Administrator, demanding a reversal of the “reckless” TSA shoe policy.
Let me share the letter in its entirety, since I think it’s pretty interesting:
I demand that you immediately rescind former Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem’s policy forcing the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) to allow travelers to keep their shoes on at airport security screening checkpoints despite credible and disturbing reports that covert testing conducted during a performance audit identified serious findings with significant safety and security implications for the traveling public.
TSA’s policy of requiring all passengers to remove their shoes originated with the failed “Shoe Bomber” terrorist attack. This incident occurred on December 22, 2001, when Richard Reid attempted to detonate improvised explosive devices (IEDs) hidden in his shoes during a Miami-bound flight. Had Reid succeeded in detonating the IEDs concealed in his shoes, the explosives likely would have blown a hole in the fuselage and caused the plane to crash, killing 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. According to reporting by The Wall Street Journal, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) conducted covert testing that 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.”
According to DHS OIG, when investigators covertly tested the effectiveness of TSA’s airport checkpoint security screening at preventing threat items from being brought onto commercial aircraft, a significant finding was uncovered that warranted Inspector General Joseph Cuffari issuing a Seven-Day Letter on August 26, 2025, to Secretary Noem notifying the Secretary of its time-sensitive significant finding that required swift corrective action. Secretary Noem’s subsequent failure to direct DHS to engage DHS OIG on the substance of the Seven-Day Letter was outrageous, unacceptable and dangerous to the flying public.
Secretary Noem’s shoes on policy remains in effect—despite President Donald Trump publicly announcing the firing of Secretary Noem on March 5, 2026 (effective at the end of March). It is unclear, at best, whether DHS and TSA took any action to address the alarming security findings uncovered during covert field testing of TSA’s effectiveness at preventing dangerous items from being smuggled onto commercial aircraft.
Such inaction violates Federal law, Office of Management and Budget (OMB) guidance and DHS’s own directives requiring that TSA provide a Management Decision with planned corrective actions and target completion dates within 90 days after OIG’s final report is transmitted—in this case by January 30, 2026.
While under oath, you testified to Congress that you had read the DHS OIG final report in November 2025 and that you concurred with the findings and recommendations. Yet, it appears TSA not only failed to submit the Management Decision within 90 days of DHS OIG transmitting its final report but also has, to this day, still failed to comply with a critically important statutory requirement, OMB guidance and DHS directives.
Allowing a potentially catastrophic security deficiency to remain in place for seven months and counting betrays TSA’s mission. At a minimum, TSA’s failure to swiftly implement corrective action warrants the immediate withdrawal of Secretary Noem’s reckless and dangerous policy that increases the risk of a terrorist smuggling a dangerous item onto a flight.
Secretary Noem’s willingness to gamble the American people’s security in an unsuccessful attempt to boost her popularity was, and remains, a stunning failure of leadership—particularly following President Trump’s decision to launch an unconstitutional war of choice against Iran that DHS has determined, “is causing a heightened threat environment in the United States.”
I demand you immediately rescind the dangerous TSA policy that former Secretary Noem recklessly implemented, until the agency implements comprehensive corrective action and the DHS OIG tests and verifies that the updates effectively address the significant findings uncovered during covert field testing.
I’m sure people will have conflicting takes on this demand
It goes without saying that most travelers would probably prefer for the airport security screening process to be as easy as possible, and to not have to take off shoes. If the lack of requiring passengers to take off shoes doesn’t lead to some major event, then everyone would view it as a positive.
Conversely, if this doesn’t end well and this can be used in some form of terrorist plot (or whatever), you can bet that people will say “how could the government allow this, and not protect us?”
Senator Duckworth seemingly makes some good points based on safety concerns that haven’t been fully addressed, and which arose after the policy change.
I think the fundamental issue with deciding on the correct TSA screening process is that we know that the TSA misses a large percentage of prohibited items in their screening. So how can you decide on policies when the entire screening process is reliant on a high level of luck, including the wrong person not being able to sneak through with a prohibited item?
Does allowing all travelers to keep on their shoes increase the potential for a bad actor to sneak something through security? I would imagine so, based on what the research has shown. However, how does that risk compare to the added convenience and efficiency of not having to take off shoes?
I have a hard time imagining that we’re going to see a policy reversal here, though I guess we’ll see…
Bottom line
Senator Tammy Duckworth from Illinois is demanding that the TSA’s mid-2025 policy of not requiring passengers to take off shoes be reversed. She argues that research has shown that this poses a risk to our aviation ecosystem, but seemingly believes that former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem didn’t care. However, with her being fired, Duckworth is making another appeal.
What do you make of this request regarding the TSA’s shoe policy?