Desperate Airlines Plead With Congress To End Shutdown

With flights across the country being canceled by the hundreds at understaffed airports, the airline industry is ratcheting up efforts to persuade lawmakers to end the government shutdown.

Widespread flight reductions are scheduled to take effect at airports Friday, giving many air travelers their first real-life taste of the shutdown. Industry officials who’ve been pressing Congress and the White House think that could be what it takes to finally break the impasse after more than five weeks.

“While it wasn’t the purpose of [Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s] actions” — referring to an order to cut flights by 10 percent across 40 airports — it “has hopefully gotten folks on Capitol Hill to realize that there has to be something that gets things moving forward,” Airlines for America CEO and former New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu said in an interview. A4A is the industry’s main trade group in Washington.

Major airlines, industry trade associations and labor unions have been calling for an end to the shutdown for weeks, pushing senators to pass a clean continuing resolution already approved by the House to open the government. And top airline CEOs have been working the phones since the shutdown began, Sununu said, leaning on personal relationships with lawmakers from their states to advocate for a resolution.

“The healthcare fight’s important,” he said, referring to Democratic demands to extend expiring Obamacare subsidies. “But that’s not the fight of keeping the government open, that’s completely separate.”

Air traffic controllers, TSA agents and other essential federal employees have been working without pay for more than a month, leading to concerns that aviation safety could be compromised as labor shortages increase and the Thanksgiving travel rush approaches.

On Wednesday, Duffy announced the nationwide flight restrictions, calling them a safety precaution. Potentially affected airports include major hubs around Atlanta and Chicago as well all major airports around Washington and New York City.

“We’re in a new world after last night’s announcement,” said a person familiar with airline industry lobbying efforts granted anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak publicly. “The clean [continuing resolution] is the quickest way to get back to normal operations.”

“They’ve said ‘no’ to keeping the government open 14 times. [The] fifteenth time is the charm,” Sununu said. “To wait until things really get bad to force action in Washington is just a terrible sign of the times in terms of what it takes to get things done.”

Industry labor unions are also warning lawmakers of increased safety risks as the shutdown persists.

“Everyone should agree aviation safety is non-partisan,” Air Line Pilots Association president Capt. Jason Ambrosi said in a statement. “Political leaders must find a way to end the shutdown now.”

For air traffic controllers, the financial and mental strain of working 10-hour days, six days a week makes the nation’s airspace “less safe with each passing day of the shutdown,” National Air Traffic Controllers Association President Nick Daniels said in a recent statement.

Industry and labor leaders appeared side by side with Vice President JD Vance after a private meeting at the White House last week and implored lawmakers to pass the continuing resolution.

“I don’t have a position on which partisan side and how things should be settled with health care,” United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby told reporters. “Lets get a clean CR and get that negotiation done behind closed doors, without the pressure, without putting the American workers and the American economy at risk.”