Janet Napolitano blames long airport lines on sequester

Longer lines at airports are due to sequestration, said Department of Homeland Security director Janet Napolitano.

Mandated budget cuts have forced the agency to cut back security staff at the airports, and that means fewer Transportation Security Administration agents on hand to sift through flyers’ bags, Politico reported.

“Now that we are having to reduce or eliminate basically overtime both for TSA and for customs, now that we have instituted a hiring freeze … we will begin today sending out furlough notices,” Ms. Napolitano said. “We are already seeing the effects.”

Those effects?

She blamed sequestration for airport security checkpoint lines that are “150 to 200 percent as long as we would normally expect.”