WASHINGTON — Delta Air Lines is punishing Congress for failing to fund the Department of Homeland Security.
The airline company has temporarily yanked its special congressional desk service to lawmakers and staffers on Capitol Hill until Congress finally funds the DHS, which has been in a partial shutdown since Feb. 28.
“Due to the impact on resources from the longstanding government shutdown, Delta will temporarily suspend specialty services to members of Congress flying Delta,” the company said in a statement first reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
“Next to safety, Delta’s No. 1 priority is taking care of our people and customers, which has become increasingly difficult in the current environment.”
Last week, Delta CEO Ed Bastian delivered a fierce rebuke of Congress for allowing funding for DHS to lapse, which has resulted in Transportation Security Administration employees going without full pay for over a month.
Bastian called the situation “inexcusable” and railed against lawmakers for using TSA workers as “political chips.”
“It’s inexcusable that our security agents, our frontline agents, that are essential to what we do, are not being paid, and it’s ridiculous to see them being used as political chips,” Bastian told CNBC last Tuesday.
“We’re outraged.”
Delta is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. Infamously, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport was subject to some of the worst TSA wait lines of over four hours during the funding lapse, leading to lines that stretched outside the airport.
Across the country, TSA wait lines have exploded, with call-out rates, which hovered around 2% before the shutdown, jolting past 10% due to the funding lapse, according to acting Deputy TSA Administrator Adam Stahl. Close to 400 TSA workers have quit since the partial shutdown began.
Stahl also warned that there’s a risk several small airports will be forced to close down if the funding lapse continues.
TSA workers last got a full paycheck on Feb. 14, then received a partial one on Feb. 28 and missed their next pay period on March 13, according to an agency spokesperson.
Friday is their next pay period.
Democrats have been using the Senate filibuster to block a DHS funding measure as part of an effort to get sweeping reforms to the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies.
Republicans have rejected the push to ban Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers from wearing masks and their demands for a tighter judicial warrant process.
On Monday, Trump deployed ICE to airports across the country to help alleviate staffing pressures on TSA caused by the partial shutdown.
This is the third funding lapse TSA workers have weathered in six months.
Trump recently rejected a proposal to fund the rest of DHS outside of ICE and then have Republicans fund ICE via the cumbersome reconciliation process.
“I don’t think we should make any deal with the Crazy, Country Destroying, Radical Left Democrats unless, and until, they Vote with Republicans to pass ‘THE SAVE AMERICA ACT,’” Trump declared on Truth Social over the weekend.
Last week, a bill from Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) unanimously cleared the Senate to strip lawmakers of key travel perks such as the ability to bypass traditional TSA security lines at airports — though it hasn’t yet passed the House.
Others have proposed blocking lawmakers from getting paid, but Congress is blocked from changing its pay until the next Congress is sworn in by the 27th Amendment.