Former independent Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura may be late to the brouhaha over the Transportation Security Administration’s intrusive security measures, but on Monday he re-ignited the discussion with a lawsuit filed in federal court.
The lawsuit was filed against the Department of Homeland Security and the TSA. It claims that Ventura’s Fourth Amendment constitutional guarantees against unreasonable searches are violated by the enhanced procedures, which include full-body scans or intimate pat-downs.
Either a scan or a pat-down would violate his rights, says Ventura’s lawsuit.
Pat-downs, the court document says, involve “offensive touching, gripping and rubbing of the genital and other sensitive areas of his body.” These procedures “violate Governor Ventura’s basic rights to privacy and dignity.”
Body scans are similarly problematic, the document says, calling them a “warrantless, non-suspicion-based, electronically-recorded strip search.”
TSA agents, says the document, “have no factual basis to support any reasonable suspicion that Governor Ventura poses any threat to airline safety.”
Not only are such searches unwarranted, says the document, they also “meet the definition for an unlawful sexual assault.”
Ventura, a former professional wrestler nicknamed “the body,” is currently is the host of TRU TV show “Conspiracy Theory.”