The Hill News

Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-Texas) said he's concerned that a security scare on a flight from Dallas to Washington was "a dry run" for a future terrorist attack â€" and that he worried about alerting airport authorities about two suspicious passengers because of his job as a congressman.

Farenthold's flight earlier this month was canceled after two men wearing tracksuits brought a suspicious bag aboard. It was later found to contain a printer.

{mosads}"They had a lot of electronics in their carry-on, and my fear is that it was a dry run for something in the future," Farenthold said on Fox Radio's "Kilmeade and Friends."

The congressman said that he started worrying about the men when they arrived at the gate together but didn't sit next to one another. 

"They weren't dressed for the way they look and what they were doing," Farenthold said. 

The congressman said that his wife was "creeped out" and wanted him to alert the flight crew, but Farenthold worried about his profile as a congressman.

"I can't go say something, because I'm a congressman and people listen to me a little too much," Farenthold said.

Once boarded, another passenger complained to a flight attendant, who then spoke to the men. After doing so, police removed the men from the plane and the pilot informed passengers of a potential security breach.

"The flight attendant talked to them, and they creeped her out," Farenthold said.

Farenthold criticized the police for not immediately evacuating everybody from the plane at that time.

"They should've gotten us off the plane when they got everyone else off the plane," he said.

The freshman congressman sits on the Homeland Security Committee, and has been critical of Transportation Security Administration screening in the past. The congressman did not support the purchase of body scanners, and has argued for the deployment of more canine units and face-to-face interviews at airports instead.