Saad bin Khalid, a Pakistani-American citizen, challenged his continued placement on the No Fly List after the TSA Administrator determined in 2022 that he should remain barred from U.S. commercial flights. The government told Khalid he was "an individual who represents a threat of engaging in or conducting a violent act of terrorism and [is] operationally capable of doing so," citing concerns about his "association with a known terrorist organization" and his "candor" during a 2012 FBI interview about his activities in Pakistan from 2008 to 2012.
Writing for a unanimous three-judge panel, Circuit Judge Pillard rejected Khalid's constitutional and statutory challenges to both his listing and the adequacy of the redress process. "While Americans 'enjoy[] 'the right to travel,'' that does not imply 'a fundamental right to travel by airplane,'" Pillard wrote, citing binding circuit precedent. The court emphasized that Khalid "may continue to travel to, from, and inside of the United States by means other than airplanes."
The court rejected Khalid's procedural due process arguments, noting that protecting national security "is a government interest of the highest order" and that "alternatives to the No Fly List cannot be 100 percent effective against all potential threat[s]." Pillard wrote that given other travel options remain available, the government's security concerns "outweigh [his] individual travel preferences."
The court also dismissed Khalid's claim under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act for lack of standing, finding that his assertion that the No Fly List burdens his ability to perform the Islamic pilgrimage of Hajj was too speculative. Khalid "currently resides in Pakistan" and "asserts his RFRA claim without any description of concrete plans to travel to Saudi Arabia via U.S. airspace," Pillard wrote.
After reviewing both public and classified portions of the administrative record, Pillard concluded that "the TSA Administrator acted with adequate justification when he retained Khalid on the No Fly List." The court noted that agencies can reasonably "respect [the] views of such other agencies as to those problems" for which those "other agencies are more directly responsible and more competent," referring to the FBI's Threat Screening Center that maintains the terrorist watchlist.