Read U.S. Department of Homeland Security News Release here: https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/06/04/dhs-unearths-tsa-corruption-sitting-us-senators-husband-received-blanket-exemption

President Trump’s Department of Homeland Security accused U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of successfully lobbying the prior administration in 2023 to remove her husband attorney and Democratic activist William Shaheen from a government watchlist.

“New Hampshire Senator Jeanne Shaheen’s husband traveled with a known or suspected terrorist three times in a single year,” the DHS press release said Wednesday, after CBS reported a story Tuesday. The suspected terrorist hasn’t been identified and CBS reported the person was taken off the watch list in 2023.

CBS reported, “Shortly after New Hampshire Democrat Jeanne Shaheen spoke with the Transportation Security Administration about her husband, William Shaheen, TSA officials removed him from a list of people subjected to additional scrutiny under TSA’s ‘Quiet Skies’ domestic surveillance program.”

William Shaheen didn’t respond Wednesday to a phone message seeking comment.

But a spokesman for Sen. Shaheen, a Democrat who has been highly critical of President Trump, said in an email: “Senator Shaheen contacted the Transportation Security Administration after her husband was subjected to several extensive, invasive and degrading searches at airport checkpoints. There were reportedly five such searches.

“Senator Shaheen sought to understand the nature and cause of these searches. Any suggestion that the Senator’s husband was supposedly included on a Quiet Skies list is news to her and had never been raised before yesterday. Nor was she aware of any action taken following her call to remove him from such a list.”

CBS reported William Shaheen, a Lebanese American who is active in the Arab-American community, “was then placed on a different list, which excluded him from any future advanced screening, including random checks at airport TSA checkpoints, two of the sources said.”

The DHS press release described what it called “the politicization of TSA’s watchlisting program under the Biden administration.

“Discovered documents, correspondence, and timelines clearly highlight the Biden’s inconsistent application of Silent Partners Quiet Skies and watchlisting programs, circumventing security policies to benefit politically aligned friends and family at the expense of the American people,” the release said.

“It is clear that this program was used as a political rolodex of the Biden Administration—weaponized against its political foes and to benefit their well-heeled friends,” said Secretary Kristi Noem. “This program should have been about the equal application of security, instead it was corrupted to be about political targeting. The Trump Administration will restore the integrity, privacy, and equal application of the law for all Americans, including aviation screening.”

Sen. Shaheen’s spokesman said out of respect for their privacy, they wouldn’t identify the person William Shaheen traveled with other than to say that they are an Arab American attorney and at no point was there any indication that this individual was on the KST list.

The Shaheen’s oldest daughter Stefany Shaheen of Portsmouth recently announced she is running for Congress.

The headline from the DHS press release Wednesday said: “DHS Unearths TSA Corruption: Sitting US Senator’s Husband Received Blanket Exemption from National Security Review After Traveling with Known or Suspected Terrorist.”