The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Thursday said it wants airports to deal with unruly passengers after a surge of attacks and threats against flight attendants amid COVID-19 masking mandates on airplanes. The agency previously pledged to take more aggressive action against passengers who go against safety rules. But now, the FAA wants airports to tamp down the bad behavior. “While the FAA has levied civil fines against unruly passengers, it has no authority to prosecute criminal cases,” FAA Administrator Steve Dickson wrote to airport officials around the country in a letter released on Thursday. The FAA stated that it’s received 3,715 reports of unruly passengers since the beginning of 2021 and made 628 investigations. But in 2019, the agency initiated fewer than 150 investigations into unruly passenger behavior. Meanwhile, dozens of Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers have been assaulted since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the agency. …