WASHINGTON — Vice President JD Vance and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy on Thursday predicted air traffic “disaster” if the government shutdown stretches into November, as overworked and unpaid workers are pushed to the brink and more flights are delayed.
The dire warnings came after Vance and Duffy huddled at the White House with the CEO of United Airlines, Teamsters’ boss Sean O’Brien and former New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, who now reps the largest trade association for cargo and passenger airlines, to talk over the troubling travel forecast for the Thanksgiving holiday.
“It’ll be a disaster in aviation,” Duffy exclaimed. “October is a slower, air travel month, and we have great weather in October. And so you’ve seen minimal disruption because of good weather and slower travel.
“But as we go into November, travel picks up as people start to look at going to see their families, kids come home from college,” he added.
Unpaid air traffic controllers may be forced to leave work to find a second job to pay their bills “and you’re going to have mass issues throughout the airspace,” he said.
“People will not be able to go from one place to the other because of a government shutdown. And I hope Democrats don’t take it to that point,” Duffy added, casting blame on Senate Democrats for refusing to provide the votes needed to reopen the government in full.
Vance added: “The House of Representatives has voted affirmatively to reopen the United States government. Fifty-two Republicans and three Democrats consistently vote to reopen the United States government. But we need 60 votes.”
“We need to end the craziness,” the vice president said.
Senate Democrats have voted more than a dozen times against a House-passed stopgap measure to fund the government at current levels until Nov. 21, in an effort to force concessions on Affordable Care Act subsidies that they have said would lower health care premiums.
Republican leaders in Congress have agreed to hold a separate vote on those Obamacare subsidies after passing the so-called “clean” continuing resolution that would begin payments again for federal workers.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has led the opposition to that bill, while Sens. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) and Angus King (I-Maine) have always voted with the GOP.
“To their great credit, three moderate Democrats joined 52 Senate Republicans to vote to re-open the government,” Vance said. “We need five more reasonable Democrats to put the American people first and re-open the government.”
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby lamented how long the shutdown has lasted, which is close to surpassing the 35-day record set during Trump’s first administration.
“It’s been 30 days, and while I don’t have a position on which partisan side and how things should be settled with healthcare, it has been 30 days,” Kirby told reporters outside the White House.
“Let’s 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,” Kirby added.
O’Brien noted that his union had endorsed the “clean CR” three weeks prior.
“Put the politics aside, get to the table, negotiate a deal, pass a clean CR right now and then figure out the problems moving forward,” he said.
Kirby thanked Duffy, air traffic controllers, the Federal Aviation Administration and the Transportation Security Administration for “working hard” — without pay — amid the shutdown.
“They are keeping the skies safe. They’ve minimized delays — fewer than 2% of flights have been delayed so far because of air traffic control shortage,” he said.
“So they’ve done a great job. But it’s putting stress on people. It’s not fair to those people. It’s also putting stress on the economy.”
But even some senators have now been affected by the flight delays as they prepare to leave town for the weekend, with the FAA attributing the snarls at DCA Reagan airport to staffing shortages.
