D.C. Circuit Rules District Courts Cannot Hear Watchlist Challenges While No Fly Order Stands

Circuit Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson, writing for the panel, ruled that the jurisdictional divide flows from the statutory framework governing the two overlapping lists. Challenges to the No Fly List, after administrative redress, must proceed as petitions for review under 49 U.S.C. § 46110, which vests exclusive jurisdiction in the circuit courts. Challenges to the broader Terrorist Watchlist, maintained by the Threat Screening Center, belong in district court under federal question jurisdiction.

The problem, the court held, is that the two lists are interdependent. No Fly List designation requires prior placement on the Terrorist Watchlist. That linkage left the district court unable to provide meaningful relief on the watchlist claim alone.

The case involves Saad Bin Khalid, a U.S. citizen of Pakistani descent who was denied boarding on an Emirates Airline flight from Pakistan to the United States in 2019. After pursuing administrative redress through the DHS Traveler Redress Inquiry Program, the TSA Administrator issued a final order in June 2022 maintaining Khalid on the No Fly List, determining he "is an individual who represents a threat of engaging in or conducting a violent act of terrorism and who is operationally capable of doing so."

The district court had dismissed the case for lack of Article III standing, finding that although Khalid suffered concrete injuries — delayed visa processing for his wife and potential land border screening burdens — it could not redress those harms without removing him from the No Fly List, a power reserved to the circuit court.

Henderson wrote that "a challenge to inclusion on the No Fly List brought after administrative redress is pursued must proceed as a petition for review under 49 U.S.C. § 46110, which grants the circuit court exclusive jurisdiction of TSA Administrator orders." The panel outlined a procedural path for Khalid: he must "first seek removal from the No Fly List in circuit court" before returning to district court to challenge his Terrorist Watchlist placement. Henderson acknowledged that "it is not unprecedented for a jurisdictional scheme to require plaintiffs to file two actions in different courts to obtain complete relief."

Circuit Judge Nina Pillard dissented, arguing the majority's approach created an impermissible gap in judicial review.

The case is Saad Khalid v. Todd Blanche, No. 24-5091 (D.C. Cir. 2026).