The brief // by Ben FrankelThe TSA-Chaffetz skirmish: The latest round

In the past ten days we have witnessed an intense legal-political skirmish between DHS and two of its staunchest critics on the Hill — Representatives Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) and Darrell Issa (R-California). At issue is information that the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) had given the subcommittee headed by Chaffetz ahead of hearings the subcommittee was to hold on airport security.

Chaffetz released the information in some of these documents to the press a day before the hearings, then repeated the information in his open-to-the-public opening statement. DHS angrily charged that in revealing the information, Chaffetz had violated the law.

Here are the facts of the story:

1. The Chaffetz revelations

On Tuesday last week, the office of Representative Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) released to the press information which the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) had given to the committee ahead of a Wednesday hearing on aviation security. Chaffetz, in his opening statement on Wednesday, publicly repeated the information contained in some of the documents submitted by TSA.

The documents were classified by the agency as “sensitive security information.”

Among the information Chaffetz released to the press were facts and numbers describing security breaches at U.S. airports since 2011. There were 25,000 such breaches of security in the last ten years. Of the 25,000 breaches, more than 14,000 people were able to access sensitive areas of the airport and some 6,000 passengers and carry-on luggage were able to make it past government checkpoints without proper scrutiny.

“[And] these are just the ones we know about,” Chaffetz said.

In response to Caffetz’s revelations, TSA, in a statement to ABC News, said the 25,000 breaches “represent a tiny fraction of one percent” of the billions of passengers screened at U.S. airports since the 9/11 terror attacks. “Airports today are safer than ever before,” the statement said.

The Bureau of Transportation Statistics says that more than 4.3 billion passengers traveled through major U.S. airports between November 2001 and December 2010.

TSA told AP that the breach count was misleading because a breach is defined as anything from a misplaced checked bag to someone who was caught in the act of breaching security.

Chaffetz expressed his concern about other aspects of airport security as well. For example, he said he was concerned that the TSA has given airport credentials to nearly a million workers, presenting potential insider threat.

2. DHS response to Chaffetz

On Wednesday of last week, in response Chaffetz’s revelations, DHS complained that Chaffetz had inappropriately disclosed sensitive security