Midway through 2021, the Federal Air Marshal Service solicited volunteers willing to travel to the southern border for 30 days to assist with the processing of an increasing number of illegal immigrants in detention. The administration stated earlier this month that the deployments would no longer be optional but rather required.

The air marshals contested the order, but only succeeded in reducing the duration of the deployment from 30 to 21 days. On December 7, DHS sent at least 150 more air marshals to the border. Currently, scores of employees are planning to reject and are expecting to be fired for taking a position.

“Air marshals are deployed two to three nights a week. Now they’re taking them away, and their marriages are already on the rocks,” David Londo, President of the Air Marshal National Council, said.

“Morale is so destroyed from this,” said Londo, whose organization serves as an association, not a union. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”

And the border marshals have been assigned mundane tasks. Londo stated that air marshals plucked from flights and transported to the border were “heating up sandwiches,”  transporting immigrants in detention to the hospital and waiting there for hours, and basically babysitting adults who are already detained.

“These highly skilled [air marshals] are being made to perform mainly non-law enforcement civilian humanitarian duties,” Londo wrote in the letter obtained first by the Washington Examiner.

The Miami Field Office of the Federal Air Marshal Service said on Monday that the deployments will now extend forever.

In a letter submitted to DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari and acquired by the Examiner, Hondo allegedly accused TSA Administrator David Pekoske and Federal Air Marshal Service Director Tirrell Stevenson of  “fraud, waste, and abuse of authority and violations of federal law.”

In a letter dated November 18, Hondo requested an investigation into the constitutionality of air marshal deployments. He noted that the only exemption to dismissing air marshals would be a proclaimed national emergency, which has not yet occurred. Even in the event of a proclaimed emergency, air marshals would be restricted to assisting other authorities with transportation-related concerns.

The letter was issued on Monday to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, the TSA, and the Federal Air Marshal Service.

Now, scores of federal air marshals have decided to disobey an order from the Biden administration to report to the southern border. As passengers take to the skies during the busiest travel period of the year, there is an open revolt against the Biden administration over a plan that would remove government protection from 99 percent of commercial flights.

“The rank and file air marshals are going to refuse to deploy and risk termination,” said Londo in a phone call with the Washington Examiner on Tuesday. “You’re almost going to have a mutiny of a federal agency, which is unheard of.”

More on this story via The Republic Brief:

The overseeing agency, the Transportation Security Administration, said in a statement provided after deadline that claims that air marshals are doing menial tasks were “entirely inaccurate and does not reflect the critical and professional law enforcement role these officers perform.” CONTINUE READING…