A hot mic before Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s Monday press conference picked up an unexpectedly candid glimpse into how some TSA agents actually feel about their jobs.
The audio captured one of the agents complaining about being “scared” of his superior before the event at Tampa International Airport in Florida, where Noem presented over a dozen TSA agents with $10,000 bonus checks for working without pay during the government shutdown.
“I used to be terrified of [her] when I started in HR, I was so scared of her,” a TSA agent could be heard saying in a video shared by reporter Alexander Willis to X. “She was just really busy; she did, like, discipline stuff in HR, so being an officer, she didn’t trust me to be around any of it because she didn’t know if I had a big mouth or not.”
The agent does not reveal the colleague’s identity.
That agent, along with another, also complained about how busy their work schedules were.
“Now you can no longer go to the store,” they could be heard saying. “I wish I had Sunday-Monday or Friday-Saturday [off], because having both weekend days off is great, but it’s frustrating sometimes.”
The TSA, which falls under Noem’s DHS, was hit hard by October’s government shutdown—the longest in American history—which resulted from Democrats’ refusal to sign a spending bill that didn’t guarantee an extension to Affordable Care Act subsidies.
After receiving only a partial paycheck at the beginning of October, TSA agents—who are classified as essential employees—worked for weeks without pay until the shutdown ended on November 12, after six Democrats broke party lines to pass a temporary spending bill.
Like an earlier event in November at the Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, the “bonus checks” Noem presented to TSA employees onstage at Tampa International were not actual checks and were not given to all employees.
Noem clarified that the envelopes given to the agents contained a piece of paper stating that the money would be added to their next paycheck via direct deposit. Only employees nominated by their superiors for “exemplary service” were awarded the $10,000 bonus.
The TSA employs over 50,000 transportation security officers out of its approximate 65,000 total employees.
The DHS did not immediately respond to request for comment.
