Print edition: 
On the heels of Independence Day, Sedgwick County Commissioner Richard Ranzau questioned whether security measures at U.S. airports infringe on liberty and freedom and said he would not fly with his children.
"I'm not going to put them in the position to essentially be sexually assaulted by TSA agents, by my government," he said.
Ranzau's comments about the Transportation Security Administration came at the end of the commission's meeting Wednesday.
He said he has taken time this week to "reflect on what freedom and liberty really mean. . . Are we truly free? Do we truly have our liberty?"
Is government, he pondered, protecting liberty or infringing on it?
"At what point is enough enough?" he asked.
Ranzau's comments come after a 95-year-old woman at a Florida airport removed her adult diaper to be checked by security. The woman's daughter said security officials did not demand the diaper be removed but made it clear the diaper would have to be inspected.
Ranzau noted the pat-down of a baby at Kansas City International Airport and a situation involving a man with bladder cancer as examples where government went too far.
"These actions are not consistent with freedom and liberty," he said.
Security precautions changed after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Carrie Harmon, a regional public affairs manager with the TSA, sent The Eagle a statement in response to Ranzau's comments.
"TSA officers are trained to work with parents to ensure a respectful screening process for the entire family while providing the best possible security for all travelers," the statement read. "Children under 12 years old who require extra screening receive a modified pat-down. Most recently, TSA Administrator John Pistole announced that TSA is working to give security officers more options for resolving screening anomalies with young children. We are working to implement this policy, which will ultimately reduce —though not eliminate — pat-downs of children."
Pat-down procedures, Harmon said in an e-mail, are used when an alarm sounds at a walk-through metal detector, if an anomaly is detected during screening with advanced imaging technology or during random screening. Passengers who opt out of advanced imaging technology receive alternate screening, which includes a pat-down.
Same-gender agents administer pat-downs, and passengers have the right to request a private screening at any time in the screening process.
Harmon said that fewer than 3 percent of passengers are given pat-downs.
Ranzau called some actions by the TSA "just ridiculous."
"They're doing things that if an ordinary citizen would do, they'd be charged, OK?" Ranzau said in an interview after the meeting. "And they're doing it without probable cause or a search warrant."
The commissioner said Americans would not stand for it if police told them they would have to be searched to cross the street or enter a city, especially, he added, without probable cause.
"Yet we stand for it when we fly," Ranzau said.
He said he was not willing to trade freedom for safety.
"I will not fly with my children," Ranzau said of his 7-, 9- and 11-year-old children.
He later said his family doesn't have occasion to fly much. When his children are older, he said, they will have the right to decide whether they want to undergo security precautions to fly.
Other commissioners did not respond to Ranzau's comments.
Chairman Dave Unruh said it seemed to "be a personal issue with him."
Unruh recently told The Eagle he was considering putting into place some restrictions about what commissioners talk about at the end of their meetings.
Unruh said he didn't want to "deny anyone's First Amendment rights," but he said commissioners should "use good judgment and a balanced approach to what their responsibility as a commissioner is."
Ranzau and Commissioner Karl Peterjohn on Wednesday defended their right to speak out.
