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POLITICS

Most Flyers Okay With Full-Body Scans, Pat Downs

Most voters who fly appear comfortable with the federal Transportation Safety Administration’s new airport security measures.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey, taken Sunday night at the close of the Thanksgiving holiday travel weekend, finds that 51% rate airline security as good or excellent, while just 16% view it as poor.  (To see survey question wording, click here.)

Seventy-five percent (75%) of voters who fly at least once a year think it is appropriate to require some passengers to have either a full-body scan or full-body pat down before boarding an airliner. Eighteen percent (18%) disagree and say such measures are not appropriate.

Support for the techniques is even higher among those who fly once a month or more often.

In January, just after an unsuccessful terrorist bombing attempt on an airliner landing in Detroit, 71% of Americans favored the use of full-body scanners at airports.

(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.

The survey of 354 Likely Voters Who Fly At Least Once A Year was conducted on November 28, 2010 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 5 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

?Do regular flyers think airport security is too strict or not strict enough? How do they feel about profiling as a security measure? Become a Platinum member and find out. 

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