WASHINGTON—The normal control tower staffing at the Washington airport is one controller per plane and one per helicopter. When the crash happened the staffing level was only half that with just one aircraft controller having to do both jobs. In fact, there was only one controller in the tower having to handle a constant flow of airplanes and helicopters.
In addition to moving fast to cut FAA personnel on his first day in office and freezing federal hiring a few days later, Trump did not appoint someone to head the FAA itself until after the crash. Despite his failures, as families of victims and a nation was in shock and grieving, the president disgustingly came out and blamed DEI, Biden, and Obama for the crash that sent all passengers and crew to their deaths as they plunged into the icy Potomac River. Neither Biden nor Obama had disasters of this nature happen on their watch. It was the worst airline disaster in the nation since 2001.
Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia said this morning that under the advice of Elon Musk, Trump, when he took office, immediately fired everyone on the FAA’s safety committee and that, after the crash, the president was desperate to divert attention away from what he did.
Continuing his campaign against diversity initiatives in the federal government, Trump played that card in discussing the fatal collision of a Blackhawk Army helicopter with an American Eagle jet over Washington National Airport. With absolutely no evidence, Trump charged that Democratic-backed diversity initiatives at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) weakened safety oversight there, implying they led to the collision.
Trump began by calling the crash, which killed 67 people, “a tragedy of terrible proportions.”
That attitude didn’t last long. Trump promptly began playing the blame game, with minorities, as usual, as his targets. Trump’s vice-president, J.D. Vance, and his man in charge of the military, former Fox “news” commentator Pete Hegseth, echoed his charges.
Trump claimed the FAA, in pursuit of diversity, hired “people with disabilities, including dwarfism, missing limbs and intellectual disabilities.
“A group within the FAA determined the workforce was too white, then they had concerted efforts to get the administration to change that and to change it immediately,” Trump told reporters. “This was in the Obama administration.” The truth is that 84 percent of the controllers are white.
Trump conveniently ignored the fact that just days before he had announced an unconstitutional shutdown of much of the federal government. When a judge halted that scheme, Trump proposed firing all two million federal workers, including the FAA’s air traffic controllers, giving each worker eight months’ worth of severance pay. That brought chaos and confusion to the FAA controllers as it did to millions of other federal workers. The combination of that and short staffing the night of the crash helped make an already difficult job even tougher.
Those Trump plans, including emails Trump’s acting budget director sent out with the mass firing scheme, did not exactly lift morale among any federal workers, the air traffic controllers included.
But Trump’s words also play into the hands of the careless corporate class, including airline honchos, who have turned jetliners into airborne versions of crowded intercity buses—and who welcome budget cuts that reduce federal oversight of the safety of their operations.
The Associated Press reported one controller was monitoring and directing the copter and the plane and two separate monitors in D.C.’s crowded airspace above the airport. The controller gave the copter permission to cut behind the job, but told the copter to keep a minimum separation, audio of their communications reveals. AP also reported there was a near-miss at National the day before between a copter and another jet.
Normally has multiple controllers on duty
National Airport normally has multiple controllers in its tower, and the FAA did not say why only one was working two positions at the time of the collision. Last year, in response to constant national shortages of controllers—and the resulting fatigue and overwork—the FAA and the controllers’ union, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, negotiated a new schedule with more hours off between shifts:
Controllers would get 10 hours off between shifts, 12 hours off before and after a midnight shift, and a limit on consecutive overtime assignments, starting this year. The job of keeping track of dozens of planes at the same time is so stressful that until recently the FAA’s mandatory retirement age for controllers was 55.
Both the copter and the plane plunged into the icy Potomac River. The plane’s fuselage broke into three sections, resting upside down under eight feet of water. The copter pilot and two other soldiers on a training mission, the jet’s two pilots, two flight attendants, and at least 60 passengers died.
Trump also blamed Biden’s Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who happens to be a member of another group Trump hates, LGBTQ people.
“He’s a disaster now. He’s just got a good line of bullshit,” Trump said of Buttigieg. “Well he runs it, 45,000 people, and he’s run it right into the ground with his diversity.” The 45,000 number covers the entire FAA. In a post on Twitter/X, Buttigieg called Trump’s comments “despicable.”
“As families grieve, Trump should be leading, not lying. We put safety first, drove down close calls, grew Air Traffic Control, and had zero commercial airline crash fatalities out of millions of flights on our watch,” Buttigieg posted. “Time for the president to show actual leadership and explain what he will do to prevent this from happening again.”
Reporters challenged Trump, saying the air traffic controllers may not have done anything wrong, according to preliminary findings. It’s “common sense,” he replied.
Common sense or not, and diversity or not, the nation’s air traffic control system—which is supposed to keep such crashes from occurring and does, by and large—is severely understaffed, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association has pointed out for years.
“Despite meeting its self-imposed air traffic controller hiring goals for much of the past decade, the FAA has not kept up with attrition,” then-NATCA President Rich Santa told the House Transportation Committee two years ago. “The National Airspace System remains near a 30-year low in the number of fully certified controllers.
“By the end of Fiscal Year (FY) 2022, there were 1,200 fewer certified professional controllers (CPCs) employed by the FAA than a decade earlier and 6% of those who remain are eligible to retire.” NATCA had no immediate comment on the crash.
Trump has trashed diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs in the government. He put all DEI workers on administrative leave, with the message “Don’t call us, we’ll call you” back to different jobs. He’s also prodding the corporate class to eliminate DEI initiatives. Unions took a different tack.
Union offered condolences
The Association of Flight Attendants/CWA offered condolences, but, more importantly, counseling to members who may need it. So did the AFL-CIO Transportation Trades Department—which also pleaded with people not to reach hasty conclusions or engage in a blame game right now.
“Around 9 p.m. Eastern tonight,” January 29, “a PSA Airlines Bombardier CRJ700 regional jet collided in midair with a Sikorsky H-60 helicopter while on approach to Runway 33 at Washington National Airport,” AFA-CWA said. “PSA was operating as Flight 5342 for American Airlines” flying in from Wichita, Kansas.
“AFA has mobilized the Employee Assistance Program and officer resources to support you. If you or one of your colleagues would like to speak confidentially to an AFA EAP representative, please call the AFA EAP at 800-424-2406. We will update you as we receive additional information about this tragic incident and its impact on operations.”
The union asked individual flight attendants not to speak to the media, not to ask AFA about other issues “unless it is urgent during this immediate response time,” to tell friends and families they are safe, and to refer questions to the union’s website.
“Our hearts are heavy for all those involved in this tragedy and for all those affected by this incident. Whenever tragedy touches one member of our airline family, it impacts us all,” said the three officers of AFA’s local for PSA flight attendants, President Mary Guerrero, Vice President Josue Rodriguez, and Secretary Carly Davis.
“We ask the public to keep the families in your thoughts and respect efforts to get information to loved ones first as everyone clings to hope for survivors. Please avoid speculation at any time,” AFA-CWA President Sara Nelson added.
The Airline Pilots Association said it was “shocked and saddened” by the crash and the deaths of passengers and crew members. The jet’s pilot and co-pilot were union members. ALPA is also sending its accident investigation team to help the National Transportation Safety Board’s probers.
AFL-CIO Transportation Trades Department President Greg Regan and Secretary-Treasurer Shari Semelsberger called the crash “the darkest day in aviation history” since 2009. “We are devastated by the loss of all 64 souls on board Flight 5342, including 60 passengers and four crew members, as well as the three service members aboard the Black Hawk helicopter. Our hearts are with the families, friends, and loved ones of all who perished. May their memories be a blessing.
“The aviation industry is widely unionized, and a loss of this magnitude is felt across our entire labor family. An injury to one is an injury to all. We extend our deepest condolences to our siblings at the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA) and the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA), whose members were crewing the plane. Our sympathies are also with UA Steamfitters Local 602, who had four members on the flight” along with figure skaters from the U.S. and abroad.
Refuting Trump, Regan pointed out that “dedicated” NATCA controllers perform “essential work…every day to keep our flying skies safe.
“The days and weeks ahead are unthinkable for the individuals whose lives have been forever altered by this tragedy…As we wait for the National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Aviation Administration to conclude its investigation, we urge everyone to refrain from speculating and to let the facts guide our path forward.”
Trump, for one, isn’t.
Trump and his MAGA allies are invoking the specter of DEI and stoking fear over every issue confronting the U.S. economy, society, and military to consolidate the MAGA base, create divisions within the multi-racial working class, and push their anti-people agenda. Many of Trump’s executive orders target eliminating all DEI initiatives, affirmative action, and efforts to foster a more racially diverse federal workforce and equitable society.
After taking office, Trump forced out the FAA director, Michael Whitaker, fired 100 other top FAA security officers and the Aviation Security Advisory Committee, and instituted a hiring freeze on air traffic controllers without offering plans to solve the crisis.
Musk forced out Michael Whitaker as head of the FAA. Under Whitaker, the agency instituted stricter enforcement action against Boeing to fix its airline door malfunction and against SpaceX for safety violations. Before the Senate confirmed Whitaker in 2023, the agency had been without a Senate-confirmed head for over twenty months due to GOP opposition to a previous Biden nominee.
On Jan. 30, Trump named Chris Rocheleau, an FAA administrator, as acting head of the FAA.
The air traffic control system has been under significant stress for years, and aviation experts expect the crisis to worsen over the next decade. According to a report by the United States Department of Transportation (DOT) Inspector General, 77% of air traffic control towers face labor shortages due to the retirements of exhausted controllers during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Last May, the FAA reported a shortage of 3,000 air traffic controllers.
DOT Inspector General Eric Soskin was dismissed by Trump on Jan. 25, along with more than a dozen others.
Since May 2024, the FAA has recorded 1,115 runway incursions. Furthermore, over 180 operational incidents were recorded that could be traced back to air traffic controllers’ decisions.
How much the chaos at the FAA sparked by Trump contributed to the accident remains to be seen. However, the tragedy points out the danger of Musk and MAGA’s drive to downsize the federal workforce engaged in essential services and eliminate regulations and inspector generals.
Despite dire warnings, in 2023, lawmakers, under pressure from the airline industry, added flights to Reagan Airport when a bipartisan bill was passed and signed by President Biden. Delta Airlines also pushed the legislation.
Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., warned of the dangers and potential collisions if Congress approved more flights for the already overstretched airport.
“God forbid waking up and looking in a mirror one day and say, ‘Wow, I was warned. I was warned, and I shouldn’t have done this,'” Kaine said at the time.
For decades, controller shortages and underfunding have stressed the nation’s air traffic control system. In 1981, the Air Traffic Controllers Union struck over staffing and pay and was fired en masse by President Ronald Reagan in the opening of a war on labor. Over the years, controller shortages have led to burnout, early retirements, severe health issues, and even suicides among controllers.
The shortage crisis remains unresolved. “Our nation is facing an aviation safety crisis,” stated Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), a military veteran and helicopter pilot. “Near-misses occur far too frequently, and I refuse to be complacent in waiting to act until the next runway incursion results in a fatal collision.”
The crisis and danger in the skies may get far worse if Trump continues to reduce the federal workforce, regulatory agencies, and the government’s ability to be accountable for its actions.
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