More than 11,000 airline pilots represented by ALPA have received notice of potential furlough, and without a clean extension of the CARES Act Payroll Support Program, hundreds of thousands of employees are at risk of losing their jobs and health insurance benefits on October 1, 2020. But ALPA is not alone in calling on Congress for help.
Also sounding the alarm are executives from major airlines, along with a bipartisan group of government leaders, who are in favor of extending the Payroll Support Program to protect jobs in the airline industry.
President Donald J. Trump
Trump endorses extended payroll protection for airline workers to avoid COVID-19 layoffs
“We don’t want to lose our airlines,” Trump told reporters. “If they’re looking at that, whether they’re Republican or Democrat, I’d certainly be in favor.”
Scott Kirby, United Airlines CEO
United CEO doing his own lobbying in Washington
“And so, the only way that we’re going to avoid the involuntary furloughs on October 1, at this point, is an extension of the Payroll Support Program,” said Kirby.
Ed Bastian, Delta Air Lines CEO
“If we do not get the support [from Congress] that we need, I know within the industry there will be furloughs and probably some pretty large numbers of furloughs in the tens of thousands of employees,” Bastian told the Claman Countdown on Tuesday.
GOP Senators
Senators join call to extend airline bailout program as job losses loom
The senators wrote that they “support a clean extension of payroll support for passenger air carrier employees included in the Cares Act to avoid furloughs and further support those workers.”
Bipartisan House Majority
Letter urges extension of airline payroll support
“And without an extension of the PSP before then, hundreds of thousands of airline workers will be fired or furloughed on October 1.”
Capt. Joe DePete, President, Air Line Pilots Association, Int’l and Sara Nelson, President, Association of Flight Attendants–CWA
To get air travel off the ground, we need federal action
“Additional investment is needed in workers and an industry that form the foundation of our economy. We need to extend this historic workers-first program now, or hundreds of thousands of workers could lose their jobs,” the union leaders wrote.
ALPA remains on the front lines garnering support for a clean extension of the Payroll Support Program through March 31, 2021. To date, ALPA supporters—including pilots, industry stakeholders, and the public—have sent 204,000 letters to the Hill and delivered more than 77,000 tweets as part of ALPA’s Call to Action to protect pilot jobs.