Trump administration warns shutdown could force US airspace closures

The US may close portions of its airspace if the federal government shutdown continues, the transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, has warned.

Duffy made the announcement on Tuesday, as the government entered its 35th day of shutdown, tying the record for the longest in history.

The shutdown, which began on 1 October, has since left shortages of up to 3,000 air traffic controllers, according to the administration, in addition to at least 11,000 more receiving zero wages despite working as essential workers over the last two weeks.

Duffy cautioned of “mass chaos” if the government were still shutdown in a week’s time, adding: “You will see mass flight delays. You’ll see mass cancellations, and you may see us close certain parts of the airspace because we just cannot manage it, because we don’t have the air traffic controllers.”

“I’ll tell you, yes, the system is safe and if it wasn’t, we would shut it down,” he added. “We delay flights, we … tell airlines to cancel flights if we don’t have enough controllers to effectively and safely manage our skies. But with the shutdown, it would be dishonest to say that more risk is not injected into the system. There is more risk in the system.

“Make no mistake, the longer this goes on, every day these hardworking Americans have bills they have to pay, they’re being forced to make decisions and choices,” Duffy continued. “Do they go to work as an air traffic controller, or do they have to find a different job to get resources, money, to put food on their table, to put gas in their car?”

The White House issued a statement on Monday in which it blamed Democrats for long airport lines and flight delays. Since the shutdown, Republicans and Democrats have blamed each other, with Donald Trump’s administration accusing Democrats of “choos[ing] chaos every day they refuse to act”, and the House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, vowing to “not support a partisan Republican spending bill that continues to gut the healthcare of the American people”.

Most Democrats have maintained that any agreement must include an extension of healthcare tax credits to prevent sharp insurance premium hikes in 2026.

As Republicans and Democrats remain gridlocked, nearly 50% of the US’s 30 busiest airports faced air traffic controller shortages, the Federal Aviation Administration said last Friday. Echoing the FAA on Monday, Duffy told CNBC that there was a shortage of 2,000 to 3,000 air traffic controllers.

According to the FAA, at least 35 FAA facilities, among them those at major airports in New York City, Newark, Washington, Phoenix and Nashville, were dealing with staffing issues. “After 31 days without pay, air traffic controllers are under immense stress and fatigue,” the FAA said.

In addition to forcing tens of thousands of air traffic controllers to work without pay, the shutdown has also left at least 50,000 Transportation Security Administration officers without paychecks.

Last weekend, which experts have described as the “worst weekend” for air traffic controller staffing since the shutdown began, passengers faced security line waits of one to five hours at New York’s LaGuardia and JFK airports, as well as in San Diego and Houston.

In a statement to the Guardian, the TSA said: “While the vast majority of TSA’s nationwide operations remain minimally impacted by the government shutdown, occasional delays at some security checkpoints are to be expected.

“The longer the shutdown goes on, the more severe the impact on our TSA workforce who have expenses they must pay for, making it harder to show up for work when not being paid.”

The Guardian has reached out to the FAA for comment.

As of Tuesday afternoon, the total delays within, in or out of the US stood at 2,565 flights. By contrast, Monday saw 4,720 delays whereas Sunday saw a total of 5,897 delays across US airports, according to FlightAware.

Meanwhile, operations at Reagan Washington national airport in Washington DC on Tuesday grounded to a temporary halt because of a bomb threat against a United Airlines plane. The airport’s main runway reopened shortly before 1pm ET and flights have since resumed.

Several flights were diverted to other airports during the runway closure, the airport said, adding that an investigation was under way across multiple law enforcement agencies.