Six lawsuits have been filed by 13 civilians from nine states and DC against the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) in relation to the forcing of face masks for public transportation passengers via the Federal Transportation Mask Mandate (FTMM).

The plaintiffs include 12 disabled Americans who had medical exemptions or issues with said face masks, as well as a former flight attendant who quit in order to avoid having to enforce the mandate.

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Lawsuits were filed in New York, Richmond, Virginia, New Orleans, Louisiana, Cincinnati, Ohio, St. Louis, Missouri, and Atlanta, Georgia.

Lucas Wall, who runs a travel blog and a Facebook group titled Americans Against Mask Mandates, is one of those plaintiffs and wrote about the lawsuits on his blog. He explained that TSA put the FTMM into effect on February 1, 2021, under Joe Biden’s direction. When it was set to expire on May 11, it was extended until September 13.

When that timeline was up, the TSA extended the order again to January 18, 2022.

Plaintiffs are requesting that the courts declare TSA’s orders “illegal and unconstitutional to ensure they can never be extended again.”

“TSA’s function is limited by law to address security threats,” the lawsuits state. “Congress has never given the agency power to regulate the public health and welfare. Wearing face masks has nothing whatsoever to do with transportation security.”

The plaintiffs allege that the FTMM is the “greatest systemic discrimination against the disabled since the Americans with Disabilities Act was passed in 1990…By regulating intrastate transportation and commandeering state employees to enforce the mask mandate, TSA’s orders also violate the 10th Amendment to the Constitution, according to the petitions.”

“TSA has no legal authority to keep extending its mandates forcing all transportation passengers nationwide to cover their faces,” Wall said. “It’s time for the courts to put a stop to this nonsense since masks are nothing but a charade that don’t reduce transmission of COVID-19 yet harm our health in dozens of ways. I hope the Courts of Appeals will act swiftly to strike down the Federal Transportation Mask Mandate.”

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Wall wrote about one plaintiff, Michael Faris of Kentucky, who is a helicopter maintenance supervisor. As such, he flies every 12 days. “He is medically exempt by a neurologist from wearing a mask,” Wall wrote, “but the airlines refuse to grant him an exception because of the FTMM.

“Faris was injured on a United Airlines plane when blocking his breathing caused him to faint during a flight. He smashed his face on a galley cart.

“’As a person who has endured physical injury by the airlines due to these unconstitutional mandates, I am standing up for people like me,’ Faris said. ‘We cannot allow TSA to continue down the path of discriminating against Americans with medical conditions who cannot wear a face covering.’”

Another plaintiff, Kleanthis Andreadakis of Virginia, said, “I am taking a stand against these nonsensical mask mandates that have been forced on Americans by TSA. It’s absolutely appalling that our government forces us to sue for being denied rights already spelled out in laws enacted by Congress, laws the Biden Administration continues to ignore.

“We represent the tens of millions of Americans who can’t or don’t want to obstruct our breathing. We are standing up across the country to make our voices heard.”

This piece was written by Leah Anaya on October 20, 2021. It originally appeared in RedVoiceMedia.com and is used by permission.

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