MSNBC: Air Traffic Controllers Union Sues Trump over Shutdown

‘The Air Traffic Controllers Union has filed suit against President Trump’

EXCERPT:

COSTELLO: “The National Association of Air Traffic Controllers, 13,000 of whom are right now working to secure the nation’s skies, keep them safe, but doing so without a paycheck they have just filed suit against the Trump administration, essentially for having employees work without pay and also, in their view, they say that controllers are being deprived of their hard-earned compensation without the requisite due process. Controllers are responsible for ensuring the safe routing of tens of thousands of flights, often working lengthy, grueling overtime shifts to do so. In fact, they say, the job is so demanding and requires such rare skills that the FAA struggles to maintain a full complement of certified Air Traffic Controllers, even under normal circumstances. And so the Air Traffic Controllers Union now suing the Trump administration to end this specifically as it related to them, to end the government shutdown. One note, Andrea, and that is that the air, as you know, there’s always a struggle to ensure that there are enough air traffic controllers and they funnel all of them through the Air Traffic Control Academy in Oklahoma City, but the academy is shut down because of the shutdown."

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