Review – S 4298 Introduced – TSA Enrollments

Last month, Sen Wicker (R,MS) introduced S 4298, the TSA Security Threat Assessment Application Modernization Act. The bill would require TSA to standardize the enrollment and renewal processes for the TWIC, HAZMAT endorsement and the TSA PreCheck program. No funding is authorized by this bill. This bill is very similar to HR 6571 that was introduced in the House in February 2022; no action has been taken on that bill.

Moving Forward

Wicker is the Ranking Member of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee to which this bill was assigned for consideration. This certainly ensures that there is sufficient influence to see this bill considered in Committee. I do not see anything in this bill that would draw any organized opposition to this bill. I suspect that it would receive significant bipartisan support for this bill in Committee.

Again, this bill will probably not make it to the floor of the Senate as a stand-alone bill. It could be included as part of a spending or authorization bill.

Commentary

As I noted in my HR 6571 post, TSA has made a great deal of progress on making it easier to get multiple transportation credentials. This version of the bill takes more of that into consideration. The removal of the one-stop-shop requirement makes it easier for the eight states that still control their HMI application process to support this legislation.

 

For more details on the differences between this bill and HR 6571, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/s-4298-introduced - subscription required.