CLEAR Secure, the airline traveler verification company, is under fresh scrutiny from lawmakers after two new cases of potential security breaches at airports, including one where CLEAR personnel escorted a passenger through its security lines with a boarding pass retrieved from the trash, Politico reported on Monday.
The incidents come in the aftermath of a story by Bloomberg last week that CLEAR in July 2022 escorted a passenger to TSA checkpoints carrying ammo. That passenger was also traveling under a false identity, per the report. CLEAR released a press release rebutting the story and criticizing Bloomberg over its reporting, calling the incident "a single human error."
The passenger in that case was charged with weapons possession and identity theft.
Now, it's CLEAR that is a focal point of lawmakers after the two new reports surfaced, both of which involved passengers who were not even enrolled in CLEAR'S identify-vetting service, per Politico.
The incidents put a spotlight on "CLEAR's lack of oversight," a congressional aide told Politico.
Neither passenger was able to board a plane.
"After being briefed that there have been multiple security breaches over the past year due to CLEAR's lax security controls, it is apparent that the company puts its bottom line ahead of the security of our aviation system," Committee on Homeland Security member Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said in a statement to Politico.
"Each passing day the homeland is at greater risk until TSA acts to completely close these security vulnerabilities that it was alerted to last year. We cannot afford any additional delay."
In a statement to Politico about the two fresh cases, a CLEAR spokeswoman blamed the lapses on human error and said the company fired the offenders while retraining everyone else.
Similar to TSA's PreCheck program, CLEAR charges for a pre-flight screening process that allows passengers an expedited process to the front of TSA security lines, using fingerprints and iris scans — or both — without having to show ID. Those verifications happen at a CLEAR kiosk. From there, CLEAR personnel shepherd the traveler to the front of the TSA security line.
That changed last month, when TSA announced that it would require more CLEAR passengers to present IDs before proceeding to TSA's baggage screen lane.
TSA is evaluating the change and has not said whether a change to using ID 100% of the time is forthcoming.
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.