WASHINGTON — Airports nationwide might face complete closures due to the ongoing partial shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security, primarily led by Democrats, according to a high-ranking TSA official’s warning on Tuesday.
Speaking on “Fox & Friends,” Acting Deputy Administrator of the Transportation Security Administration, Adam Stahl, expressed the agency’s dire situation. “We’re fully stretched,” he remarked. “If this continues for weeks, it’s not an exaggeration to suggest we might be forced to entirely shut down some airports, particularly smaller ones, as absenteeism rates increase.”
Stahl emphasized the financial strain on TSA officers, many of whom earn around $45,000 annually, saying, “A lot of these officers can’t afford to come in.”
For several weeks, TSA screeners have been working without receiving their full salaries, leading to noticeable strain within the system. They received only partial pay at the end of February and missed their complete paychecks last Friday.
Amid these challenges, airports across the country are advising travelers to arrive three to four hours early to anticipate significant delays and long lines.
Airports across the country have been warning travelers to get to the airport 3 to 4 hours early to compensate for massive lines.
Fully 10% of TSA screeners called out of work on Sunday— up from around 2% daily before the shutdown.
Nearly 370 TSA workers have quit their jobs within the past month, according to the DHS.
Funding for the TSA and other parts of the DHS lapsed Feb. 14 due to Senate Democrats’ filibustering of a GOP-passed DHS appropriations bill, demanding sweeping concessions on immigration enforcement policy.
ICE and Border Patrol were fully funded as part of a previous bill.
Republicans have agreed to some of their demands, such as deploying body cameras, and the Trump administration wound down its massive immigration sweep in Minnesota.
But other demands, such as tighter warrant requirements and a ban on mask-wearing, have been red lines for the GOP.
DHS has been able to pay some categories of workers, including law enforcement officers in Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Customs and Border Patrol, and the US Secret Service, as well as US Coast Guard military personnel.
But some of the support staff in those agencies aren’t getting paid, and neither are TSA workers.
This is the third funding lapse within the past six months that has impacted TSA workers.
“I talked to one officer this week. She’s a single mother, and she has a special needs child, and she can’t afford to pay for her special needs child care,” Stahl recounted.
“It’s frankly unconscionable that we have Senate Democrats that are … holding our folks’ financial livelihood hostage over political games, political partizanship.”
Security line wait times have exploded in some airports across the country, taking close to three hours in some cases due to the TSA’s DHS shutdown-induced woes.
“We’re seeing call-out rates vary, but they continue to increase every single day,” Stahl said. “We may need to collapse lanes at select airports. But if there’s no action taken, particularly from Senate Democrats, this is going to get worse.”
“And there will be significant pain by the passenger as well, three [to] four hour wait times at select airports.”
