National Police Association Podcast with Guest, Sonja LaBosco, Exe. Dir. Air Marshal National Council
Hi. This is sergeant Betsy Brantner Smith with the National Police Association, and this is the National Police Association podcast. I have with me a guest today that, I have been following on x, and then I started to look into her career and and look at, some of the statements she's made, other interviews. She said she's absolutely fascinating. And, so I thought that we needed to hear from her.
Betsy Smith:She is, the executive director of the Air Marshals National Council, and, and she's just an absolute powerhouse, so you need to get to know her. Sonia La Bosco, welcome to the show.
Sonja LaBosco:Betsy, thank you so much for having me. It is an absolute pleasure to be here.
Betsy Smith:So I gotta tell you, 1st and foremost, I I literally get up in the morning when I'm checking all my news sources, and, your ex feed is one of the sources I check just because, you know, you're not afraid to to say what's happening, but you have you have great depth and insight into the government. So I and and, of course, everybody's watching to see what's happening right now. Talk about your background and then what you do now.
Sonja LaBosco:Well, Betsy, I retired from the federal air marshal service in in 2014. I actually came over, after 9/11, June of 2002. I became a federal air marshal. Prior to that, I was a Daytona Beach midnight shift sergeant. Love helping protect our community and doing the right thing.
Sonja LaBosco:And when I when I came over after 9:11, I never I never dreamed in a 1000000 years. You know, I thought I was taking an upgrade, going to a government job. You know, we all think that going to the federal government's an upgrade. I don't know why. Now I don't feel that way.
Sonja LaBosco:But at the time, you know, I wanted to I wanted to serve my country, but being in the Federal Air Marshals Service, of course, I get to see behind the scenes a lot in regards to, how how government works and how it really is not functional many of the times, with the programs that we're dumping 1,000,000,000 of dollars in. So thank you for the plug on my xFeed. I try to give the most in-depth information, correct information. Yes. I am opinionated.
Sonja LaBosco:I put my opinions in there, but I also back that up there, with documents and things that can be proven by statement of fact.
Betsy Smith:So I wanna go back and and ask you because I'm very familiar with the Daytona Beach Police Department and and, which is an excellent agency. Why law enforcement? Why'd you become a cop?
Sonja LaBosco:Well, Betsy, you know, I became a police officer. It it's not because no one in my family was in law enforcement. Honestly, I was working for minimum wage. I was making $3.35 an hour. I saw an ad in the paper one day for a police officer.
Sonja LaBosco:If you could go to the law enforcement academy that your salary, you could start off at $10 an hour. So I purely invested in going to the Police Academy because I said, hey, I'm a single parent. It's really tough out here. I can't make it on 3.35 an hour. So I went to the police academy and I tripled my salary within a couple of months.
Sonja LaBosco:So that's really how I got into law enforcement. But once I got there, I found out this was my thing. This was my niche. I was meant to do this and I've never looked back. I've had a I've had a wonderful career.
Sonja LaBosco:And you left as a sergeant, which I say is the best job in the agency. Right? I loved it. I you know, they're being around a group of like minded people, you know, as a sergeant, I always helped lift my people up that that worked with me on the street. I never felt like I was a supervisor.
Sonja LaBosco:I was responsible for the the overall totality of the scene, but I had a lot of teamwork that was brought to me in my career. And thank goodness because I made my bones long before I came to the federal government.
Betsy Smith:So you made that switch from local law enforcement, to the federal government. And and so as a as a very frequent flyer for the last 25 years, talk to people about what the air marshals do. Because I think, you know, we we all kinda hear about them. And if you're a little in the know, you can sometimes pick them out, you know, sitting somewhere on an airplane. But I don't think people really understand the extraordinary scope of, of the air marshals.
Betsy Smith:Yeah.
Sonja LaBosco:Well, you know, the good thing about me, I always had the element of surprise because no one ever made me. Nobody ever knew I was an air marshal. They had no clue who was sitting by them. It's really funny being on the aircraft. I would have people that would sit next to me and they'd say, hey, I think that guy, you know, in 3 C is an air marshal.
Sonja LaBosco:I think I know who the air marshal is. I said, I think you're right. I think that's him. But it wasn't him. It was me.
Sonja LaBosco:So a lot of funny stories there, but you know we went through a lot of training. Our training consisted of training in Artesia, New Mexico with the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center. They made us the best shooters in the world. I know during my training, I put more than 10,000 rounds down range in just a couple of months. Our tactics are second to none.
Sonja LaBosco:If you think about working in a linear environment like an aircraft, when when you're getting on an aircraft for the air marshals, we have to think about the back of the plane, the middle of the plane, the front of the plane, and of course, the cockpit. So our areas of responsibility are broad. We have 270 people we're responsible for to land safely. And I know when people fly, they're thinking about going from point a to point b, but for a federal air marshal, when we're flying, we're actually strapped into a countering weapon of mass destruction that was used against our country. So our deployment's much different from just taking a flight.
Sonja LaBosco:We have to make sure that that aircraft gets on the ground. I mean, you're carrying 12 +1000 gallons of fuel. You get a lot of lives, in your hands each day. So thousands and thousands of flights that I took later and landed safely, I felt my deployments were very successful. But it is a lot of, you do have to strategically plan, right?
Sonja LaBosco:You have a weapon. If you have to use your weapon in the aircraft, you have to think about the movement of the aircraft itself, the stability of the platform you're walking on when you're going to shoot, right? We know it's not stable in the aircraft when you get up and walk to the restroom. How many times do you see somebody fall and hit the chair, Right? Or try try try to get up the aisle.
Sonja LaBosco:It's not that easy and it's not that big of an area to work in. So we always work in teams. We train together. I there's not one air marshal in the office when I was assigned to Orlando that did not have the same training as I. So you could plug any team member in at any spot whether it was a 2, 4, 6, or 8 person team, and they knew what their role would be on the aircraft if something were to happen.
Betsy Smith:So post 91101, we, had the implementation of the, transportation security, as, administration, TSA, the bane of my existence. Why do you need air marshals if, you've got the TSA being, very successful?
Sonja LaBosco:Well, Betsy, unfortunately, they're not successful. If you look at the success rate, when you go back and they quit publishing this now, there were a point back when I was at the airport, we would have what we call red teams that would be that would come in and red teams are there to try to thwart, you know, security. They're there to try to bring in objects and instruments that are prohibited to be gone. It could be a gun, a bomb, knives, box cutters. And there was a 95% failure rate within the TSA, and that wasn't just in the airport I was assigned to, that was across the nation.
Sonja LaBosco:So they're not that successful.
Betsy Smith:And and I, my my husband who's also a police trainer, we talk about this constantly as we're traveling. He calls it security theater, and it is very frustrating. If you are, you know, like us, a law enforcement professional, you know a little bit about, security. It's incredibly frustrating, and yet we pour 1,000,000 and 1,000,000 of dollars into the TSA. And I can't can you imagine any private sector organization with a 95% failure rate continuing to get funded and protected?
Betsy Smith:It's unthinkable. Talk to me how that talk to me about how that happens.
Sonja LaBosco:Well, I mean, the thing with TSA, it is security theater. Think about this. You have to go in front of everyone in the airport and they make it like a big deal. Oh, well, now, ma'am, you have to take your shoes off. Oh, sir, you have to take your shoes off.
Sonja LaBosco:But what's happening on the other side, they're bringing illegal aliens in with no ID. They're not taking their shoes off. They're not going through the same screening that you're going through. As a matter of fact, TSA created a special concierge line for the illegals to come through to where now you are over, you know, you can sit and watch and you're taking your undergarments out of your clothing. You're being patted down.
Sonja LaBosco:I have to tell you, I've been to gynecological exams that were less evasive than a TSA pat down. Okay? The way that they go and the things they do to your body parts, it's absolutely ridiculous.
Betsy Smith:I, fly mostly out of the Tucson International Airport. The Tucson Sector, is where at least a third of all illegal aliens come into this country through. I stand next to that concierge line, Sonia, almost every week and watch exactly what you're talking about. And people didn't believe us. We're talking about this several years ago.
Betsy Smith:And people said, oh, we think you're exaggerating. And, of course, now everybody knows now that there is that special line for illegal aliens who come into that line with no identification. They've got an app provided to them by the federal government on a phone provided to them by a federal gov, by the federal government. They have brand new clothing, a Manila envelope with all their, paperwork that they need to fly anywhere that they want. And you're absolutely right.
Betsy Smith:I have been patted down extensively while watching them just go through. They don't they don't generally speaking, do not speak English, and they're just kind of routed through because the TSA agents appear to be uncomfortable even speaking to them or dealing with them.
Sonja LaBosco:Yet, if you had an 89 year old grandmother in a wheelchair, she would have to stand up and they would have to go through the wheelchair and pat it down while you have a 21 year old fighting age male, in the illegal concierge lines with no ID. Okay? That's what we're taught we're that's the hypocrisy of what TSA wants on one hand for us to believe that they're trying to keep us safe. Remember back when when the puffer machines were such a big deal that they were gonna puff all the dust off your shoes and the particles were gonna be tested for, you know, explosive detection? You know, What happened to the puffer machines?
Sonja LaBosco:They spent 1,000,000,000 of dollars on the puffer machines in every airport, major airport across United States. Let me tell you what happened to them. They're sitting in a closet. They're sitting in a closet because they don't work. So all these iterations of all these fancy technological machines that TSA is doing, I could tell you the one thing they're not doing.
Sonja LaBosco:They're taking the human element out of suspicious activity. Instead of having a puffer machine, why aren't you having agents that are down there at the security check line? And when somebody seems suspicious, why aren't we pulling them out of the line and pulling them into a room and interviewing them? Why are we not why are we taking the human element out of everything that we do and we think some type of electronic device is going to keep us safe?
Betsy Smith:Sonia, in the 19 eighties, when I was in narcotics, that was a a big time for law enforcement to profile people at airports. And and this was not, for because of security measures. It was because of drugs, being, you know, coming up from, other countries, coming up from Florida to the Chicago area where I was, and we profiled. We didn't racially profile. We just profiled exactly what you're talking about.
Betsy Smith:People who appeared suspicious, and there were, you know, specific things that we looked for, and we were pretty on target back then. Why don't we profile behavior any longer?
Sonja LaBosco:Because if we profile behavior, that means we have to hire humans. And if we hire humans, that means our buddies and our friends can't get 1,000,000,000 of dollars in contracts because TSA at the end of the day is about money. It's about contracts and giving contracts away to those that are gonna help make 1,000,000,000 of dollars and stock their portfolio. I mean, it's a domino effect. If we really wanted to keep our country safe with airport security, we would have 50 times the humans of machines that we have.
Sonja LaBosco:But we're not gonna do that because see machines, they have to have a new iteration every year. Oh, well, that's last year's machine. We gotta have new year machine. Oh, look at the new machine that we've created with the new program. Oh my goodness.
Sonja LaBosco:Now we can automate and have people walk through without even a screener involved. Now, have you seen those new machines to where you can just walk up and you're automatically screened without anybody ever looking into your bags and and you are good to go now? Can you imagine the amount of money that whoever's making on that contract is making by creating this technology that's useless?
Betsy Smith:It is absolutely extraordinary. And and so as air marshals, here you are sitting on an airplane where with a bunch of people who frankly haven't been properly screened. And that that it doesn't just endanger the passengers, it endangers the air marshal. Correct?
Sonja LaBosco:It does. And it makes everyone unsafe. And, you know, and, unfortunately, Betsy, in the last 4 years, you see that the air marshals having been flying. We've been down on the border helping bring illegals in, helping bring in terrorists into our country because we have terrorists that are loose right now in our country. So we haven't even been on the plane to keep our people safe.
Sonja LaBosco:I mean, flight incidents were at an all time high. And look, Thanksgiving. Here we are at Thanksgiving. We're coming on to one of the largest seasons again. And where are the air marshals?
Betsy Smith:It is frankly, it is frightening. What what do you see moving forward, into 2025, with a Trump administration? Do you do you see this changing in any significant way?
Sonja LaBosco:I do. I see it. I I see I see it changing completely toward, keeping our country safe, securing America the way that it should be secured. You know, the Air Marshall National Council, we worked for three and a half years on the impeach impeachment of my orcas. Three and a half years.
Sonja LaBosco:I know that I worked day and night to provide evidence to Congress to impeach Mayorkas, and the house did that. And the death blow was when the Senate voted not to impeach him. So in our our view, a vote to save my workers was a vote to kill our country. And that's basically what we feel has happened within the air marshal program. We have all all hopes that president Trump is gonna come in.
Sonja LaBosco:He's going to help set the air marshal program where it needs to be. We need to be in a law enforcement capacity. TSA is an administrative group that honestly really doesn't know what they're doing. So we need to be with a law enforcement entity that understands we're law enforcement officers and our job is to go out there and not only protect the people, but catch the bad guy and make sure they're not back out there doing the the same thing again the next day.
Betsy Smith:Are air marshals trained to spot victims of human trafficking or the traffickers themselves, on airplanes and in airports?
Sonja LaBosco:They are not. TSA does no human trafficking training. So we're not we do not have the ability ability. Air marshals are not even trained with Narcan. TSA did not train any of its employees.
Sonja LaBosco:Imagine all the Fentanyl that's being moved across the world in in in the airports. There is 0, Narcan training. There is 0 human trafficking training within TSA.
Betsy Smith:That's absolutely extraordinary because this is this is one of the things that that we see just as civilians now, in airports. You you can see, groups of people, situations that you know are are, untoward. And now we've got, you know, thousands of missing children that have been trafficked into this country, and the Biden administration can't they can't even find them. You know, and I know that Tom Homan, one of who's been a wonderful friend of this show. You know, one of the things that he talks about a lot is finding the children.
Betsy Smith:And and, you know, hopefully, that will be something that we can look forward to as we continue to look at the oversight that needs to to come, when it comes to federal, law enforcement. Who is it that oversees the TSA, the air marshals? Who's supposed to be paying attention, Sonia, to to all of this, frankly, incompetency and and, poor performance?
Sonja LaBosco:Well, we had DHS Maracas set as the as the first, and then we have the TSA administrator David Pakoski, and then we have the air marshal director Brian Belcher. So we are 0 for 3 when it comes to leadership, we have 0. Okay. We're batting we're batting 0. We're we're striking out everywhere we go down the line.
Sonja LaBosco:There is not one leader in the federal air marshal service. There's not one leader in TSA that's stepping up, trying to do the right thing.
Betsy Smith:What is a lack of leadership due to the morale of the air marshals?
Sonja LaBosco:It's crushing. It's been it's been crushing. And not only the lack of leadership, but the political targeting. You wanna talk about bad? I mean, recently, we just broke the story about Tulsi Gabbard, a a a lieutenant colonel serving in the military.
Sonja LaBosco:And we have air marshals surveilling her in physical physical security details. There's 3 air marshals on every flight that Miss Gabbard takes. Now we're reporting back in reports that she's eating snacks, what type of hat she's wearing, what type of phone she's talking on. Now, do you think that that really is what federal air marshals should be worried about right here on the heels of our country being in World War 3 and we've got terrorists in our country that we're gonna be tracking a United States military service member?
Betsy Smith:That that that is extraordinary. I not surprising, but absolutely extraordinary. And the air marshals themselves have been subjected to some pretty dastardly things having to give up personal information. Talk about that. Well, yeah.
Sonja LaBosco:I mean, we've had to give personal information up to China. You know, we were taking flights to China right before COVID. We were forced. Air marshals were severely disciplined if they did not give their full name to China, their home address, their wife, their family members. I mean, every time we turn around, there's this political pendulum that's swinging everywhere other than for the American people.
Sonja LaBosco:Operation Allies Welcome. We had to go and work the military bases for Afghan refugees. Well, guess what? Those people were never vetted. We didn't even know who they were, and we're flying them all over the country, and we're still doing that now.
Sonja LaBosco:So the air marshals have been used as nothing but a political pawn and it's been no benefit to the American people. We have to have this set right in the Trump administration. We have to get our air marshals back working in an environment where we can thwart another 911. We have to do it. That's the goal.
Betsy Smith:The the number of terrorists, and potential terrorists that have that have flooded into this country in the last 4 years is extraordinary. What what is your biggest concern about that?
Sonja LaBosco:Well, they're planning now. You know, they're planning Al Qaeda's planning they're planning in our country right now. 2025, they're go they are planning an attack here on the homeland. I know that Christopher Wray, all the times that he did testify last year about an attack on the homeland, you know, he was absent from his congressional testimony, last week. He didn't show up.
Sonja LaBosco:He or DHS Mayorkas. Let's hope they get a subpoena. Right? I hope somebody has the courage to subpoena those 2 figureheads, but there's an attack being planned on this homeland in 2025. So my biggest concern is we don't have to worry about bringing terrorists in from the outside.
Sonja LaBosco:They're already here.
Betsy Smith:And again, it's just absolutely unthinkable. And for Christopher Wray to say, you know what? I've already talked about this enough. I'm not gonna talk about it anymore, is such a danger to this country. What's your hope, Sonia, for the air marshals moving forward into a Trump administration?
Betsy Smith:Where do you you know, if you could wave your magic wand, where do you see the air marshals?
Sonja LaBosco:We need to be a component within Homeland Security investigations. We need to be an aviation component within inside a true law enforcement entity. Every other air marshal program around the world, Canadian air marshals, German air marshals, Thai air marshals. Every one of these programs is just a large aviation component in a law enforcement entity because that gives us the ability to surge. Like right now with the air marshals, we have no way to surge.
Sonja LaBosco:If there's a critical incident or a threat, we have to use our resources where they are now, which are very low. I have to tell you, we're we're we're hurting pretty bad within that area. We need to beef up our ranks. But if we were in a component of law enforcement, we could surge. So if there was a threat, HSI had 6,000 agents right now.
Sonja LaBosco:Imagine the ability for us to surge with 3 or 4000 agents when the threat was high and then when that threats dissipated we could bring those agents back and they could do regular duties. So we see this as the best way to go is with Homeland Security Investigations. Give us your best pitch to young people who might be thinking about a career in
Betsy Smith:law enforcement to come to
Sonja LaBosco:the air marshals. Please come over. Look, it's a wonderful it's it's a wonderful way to see the world. You go everywhere as a federal air marshal, you go to France, you go to Germany, there's not one country. If we've got an American flag carrier that you're going to be on those flights, you'll learn a lot, you're going to see a lot, but you're also going to try to help protect everyday people that are traveling just like myself.
Sonja LaBosco:Now that when I get on the plane, I see grandmothers and grandfathers going to to birthday parties. They're going to weddings. They're going to celebrations, and they should be able to travel safely in this country from point a to point b. So come over. It's a it it's going to be better.
Sonja LaBosco:Wait till 2025. It's gonna be
Betsy Smith:the best career ever. Sonia, where can people find you, follow you, learn more about what you're doing?
Sonja LaBosco:You can find me on Twitter, at La Bosco Sonya on Twitter or Air Marshall National Council NC dot com. That's Air Marshall National Council NC dot com. And we also have an official Air Marshall Twitter page. It's FAMS_AMNC. So you can find us in any of those locations and we'd love to have you follow us and join in in us exposing what we see as, fraud, waste, and abuse every day.
Betsy Smith:I love it. I can't thank you enough for spending time with us today. And if you'd like more information about the National Police Association, visit us at nationalpolice.org.
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