When a Transportation Secretary publicly starts talking about shutting down parts of the NAS, it raises questions. Is it really about safety, or something else? Sean Duffy’s talk of “mass chaos” does not sound like concern for the system. It sounds like control. It sounds like a message to the people who keep it running: Stay quiet, keep working, and take the blame if it fails.
Controllers and technicians continue holding the NAS together with skill and professionalism, though even that loyalty is starting to feel taken for granted. They are called essential but treated as expendable. They keep showing up without pay while those above them never miss a check. It makes you wonder if that dedication is being counted on, not respected.
What Duffy calls a worst-case scenario may not be what it seems. It looks less like a warning and more like a managed crisis, one that shifts the pressure away from him and onto the workforce and the public. By threatening airspace closures, he shifts the burden from his office to theirs, leaving open the question of whether the threat is meant to prevent chaos or to create just enough of it to make his point. The message underneath is hard to miss: If you stop carrying the load, we will let it all fall apart.
That does not look like leadership. It looks like control through pressure. The bigger gain may be control itself, controlling the narrative, controlling blame, and controlling the system’s pace. Duffy’s warning fits neatly into that pattern. It lets the administration look decisive while shifting responsibility for the crisis onto Congress and the unpaid workforce. By turning the NAS into a pressure point, they may be using the nation’s airspace less to protect safety than to protect political leverage.
The real issue is not just the shutdown but what it reveals. The NAS seems to be running on borrowed trust. Controllers and safety professionals have always been the thin line between order and chaos, but now that trust feels one-sided. When it is used to control them instead of support them, safety starts to erode.
Failure rarely comes all at once. It creeps in through neglect and excuses. Each unpaid shift and empty promise make the system a little weaker.
Duffy’s words did more than make headlines. They showed how far Washington may be willing to go to use the NAS as a bargaining chip. Once airspace becomes a political tool, the risk stops being theoretical and becomes real.
The public deserves better than a government willing to gamble with its own airspace. The workforce deserves leadership that still values honesty over optics. Until that happens, every controller and technician keeping the system alive will remain the only reason the skies stay open.
OK, Raf … you’re making accusations of political gamesmanship while simultaneously extolling the “virtues” of the (unpaid) folks who man ATC. I don’t see any recommendations on how you would fix the problem of increased sick outs and manning. Let’s hear your fix; we already know there’s a problem …
Frankly, I’m getting might bored hearing that everything is the fault of those waskully wepublicans and the President. Your intent here is clear to me … even if you’re using intimation and talking around a direct accusation …
We already learned how insufficient manning at DCA impacted the lives of 67 people in the January mid-air collision … and that was (supposedly) just a slight manning issue. What’s going on now is far, far more serious … tell us please what Sec. Duffy should do?
If I were somehow magically the Sec. of Transportation, the very first sector I’d shut down would be Washington.
Larry, I’m not playing politics here. I’m talking about a system that runs on fear and unpaid labor while the top brass play hero. Controllers aren’t out there waving party flags. They’re trying to keep the system safe with no paycheck and no backup, and under additional stress.
You asked for a fix. Fine.
Threats don’t build trust. Respect does. And about “waskully wepublicans.” This isn’t left or right. It’s leadership demanding blind loyalty. Attendance without pay, applause without respect. Straight out of a Kim Jong Un parade where everyone claps on cue and nobody dares to stop. If any White House tried this, I’d call it the same way. Politics doesn’t keep airplanes apart. Controllers do.
You’re right about DCA. Thin staffing kills. That’s not up for debate. But this isn’t about one crash. It’s about a pattern of running lean, ignoring fatigue, and pretending morale doesn’t matter until it’s too late.
If Duffy really wants to lead, he should stop the threats and start paying and respecting the folks on the front line. You can’t run a safety system on fear.
The real shutdown isn’t just in government, it’s in leadership. Pay and respect the folks keeping it open before the system shuts itself down.
Folks always talk about “unpaid labor” but is that really the case? I strongly suspect that there will be back pay coming as soon as the shutdown ends and the mess gets cleaned up.
And, yes, it is political. Had the government not shut down, none of this would be in the news right now. It is one party holding up the show and they’ve passed the same bill multiple times in the past. So what’s new? The far left wing of the party is threatening Schumer’s chances at his next election.
Oh? Is that how you read last night’s election results?
“passed the same bill multiple times in the past”
Hmmmmm.. You are referring here to the GOP legislators who supported enhanced ACA subsidies in the past? Right?
I re-read your OpEd again with ‘fresh’ eyes this AM, Raf. I don’t see what you wrote as anything but a partisan comment. You are welcome to your opinion and I should — likewise — be entitled to my own.
“A system that runs on fear and forced labor … ” C’mon, Raf … these people WILL receive their pay in arrears BY LAW. ATC types make a good living and can retire far earlier than pilots. Any of ’em that sink into financial distress after one missed paycheck are suspect IMHO. Maybe they should find other work?
OBTW … you are wrong about the military being paid. The Democrats voted against a stand alone Defense Appropriations bill last week. The Administration then used funds from three different accounts to pay them on Oct 15 and Nov 1 but it’s unlikely they’ll be able to do it again. So all that happened was a one month delay … they, too, will go without pay on Nov 15.
Larry, that is not quite right. The military was paid on October 15 only after the Pentagon shifted about $8 billion from unused research and procurement accounts. That was a quick fix, not an on going guarantee. FAA workers had no quick fix, and the November payday is still in play for all, not resolved as of now.
(Reuters, October 15 and 16 2025; AP News, October 17 2025; CBS News, November 2025)
So yes, the troops were paid, but not by law or on solid ground. It was a patch, not a plan.
“Any of ’em that sink into financial distress after one missed paycheck are suspect IMHO. Maybe they should find other work?”
Do you actually know any controllers? Sure, senior controllers earn quite a comfortable pay, but that’s not so true for entry-level controllers. It’s still more than contract controllers earn, but if you live a certain life based on a certain level of pay and then go more than a month without a single paycheck, I challenge everyone here to think about how you might have to adjust your lives if you faced the same thing,
‘If I were somehow magically the Sec. of Transportation, the very first sector I’d shut down would be Washington.’
Offering such a stunningly vacuous solution to this problem while demanding thoughtful analytical solutions from Raf – here we go again.
FAA has been struggling with funding since I started flying over 40 years ago. I remember visiting a flight service station (remember those?) to get an in-person briefing. The briefer was spraying his dot matrix printer (remember those?) ribbon with WD-40 to get a few more pages out of it. I like previous comment about shutting DC sector down. The entire government is behaving like a bunch of little kids.
“I like previous comment about shutting DC sector down.”
It sounds good at first, until you realize that the NAS is more interconnected than we’d like to think. It’s not as simple as just shutting down the DC sector, because it would have a ripple effect across the country.
Honestly, we shouldn’t even be joking about shutting down US airspace.
That was the whole point of my (purposely intended) ‘shut down DC comment.’ I knew I’d make some people’s heads explode. I see I succeeded. Thats a writing style, boys!
The members of Congress are being paid, I checked and find senior members of the Government are also being paid, but the others — including ATC types — are not. That said, they are guaranteed their pay in arrears once things start running again BY LAW! So what we’re really talking about here is … why are people who are receiving fairly decent pay levels sinking into financial distress after one missed paycheck which will be paid later? And what is Sec. Duffy supposed to do … print counterfeit money to keep ’em working?
Meanwhile, back at ATC HQ, they have a process where supervisors do not question ATC types who call in sick. So if there aren’t enough controllers to man whatever function we’re talking about … what can be done. Duffy is doing the only thing he CAN do … shut parts down. He’s warning that with a second missed paycheck for ATC types, it’s gonna get worse, he sees that and will have to take more stringent action.
The way I see it is … if ATC types can choose not to show up for work for whatever reason, then the Secretary can — likewise — shut down whatever he thinks is necessary to ensure safety.
There are a lot of “mays,” “could bes,” and “sounds like” in this…well, let’s call it what it is: a political op ed. There is an old rule in debate that says if you cannot accurately state the other side’s position then you don’t understand it well enough to argue against it. Rather than attempt to state Secretary Duffy’s position Mr. Sierra dreams one up to fit an agenda. Instead of informative opinion, Mr. Sierra gives us dialog that “fits neatly” into today’s familiar pattern of partisan political commentary.
It’s hard enough to get news these days without someone injecting politics; please don’t let this website become another left/right battleground.
Unfortunately, this government shutdown is entirely political, so there’s no way to disentangle politics from any discussion about the current crisis facing the NAS.
Regardless of who one’s preferred political “team” is, it is rather telling that this particular administration hasn’t even attempted to negotiate over this shutdown, and is instead threatening to shutdown airspace. Has any part of the NAS ever been completely closed, aside from 9/11?
Contract towers staff are still getting paid, so this threat to shutdown the NAS almost makes privatized ATC seem palatable, and maybe that is their actual goal.
The administration has tried repeatedly to negotiate the matter. Pass the short term funding and we will discuss all the issues. That offer is made daily.
That’s not a negotiation, that’s an ultimatum.
There is a way to report on politics without being partisan. Raf’s comment assigned meaning and motive absent data. This is a typical partisan tactic. Where is his speculation about the other side’s motives and intent? Crickets…
Raf wasn’t reporting on politics, he was engaging in commentary and there’s a big difference. We welcome guest blogs on all aviation subjects and I’d invite your rebuttal.
If you don’t want to call it “politics,” fine. Raf “commented” on a political topic with a clear bias.
> I’d invite your rebuttal
*SIGH* You completely missed my point. I get enough political rough-housing elsewhere on the web; I don’t need/want to see it here.
The piece may be called political, but only because the situation is. When a government threatens to shut down U.S. airspace while controllers and support work unpaid, that is politics colliding with safety, and it needs to be called out.
Controllers may be red or blue, but fatigue, stress, and unpaid shifts do not care about politics. It supports no party or agenda. It challenges decisions that endanger the system and the people who keep it running.
Nothing in it is fiction or exaggerated. It is factual, direct, and written to demand accountability. Aviation needs that kind of balance.
‘Sigh’ but if used correctly here would show how you missed Russ’s point completely – to offer rebuttal in context to Raf’s ideas laid out in the article.
Only having political bias would prevent that – or of course having nothing to contribute to the subject matter either.
Also, it might behoove you to develop ways to handle both ignorant and enlightened opinions from others so to not constantly having to recover from being beat-up on the web.
You missed the point as well. I don’t want to have to rebut someone else’s political opinions here. That’s not why I come to this website.
I don’t even know what this means.
It’s going to happen from time to time. This is a political issue with direct impact on aviation. We have to report it and comment on it.
As I said, I understand it’s a political issue. But commentary on the issue doesn’t have to be partisan.
There are a lot of “mays,” “could bes,” and “sounds like” in this…well, let’s call it what it is: a political op ed. There is an old rule in debate that says if you cannot accurately state the other side’s position then you don’t understand it well enough to argue against it. Rather than attempt to state Secretary Duffy’s position Mr. Sierra dreams one up to fit an agenda. Instead of informative opinion, Mr. Sierra gives us dialog that “fits neatly” into today’s familiar pattern of partisan political commentary.
It’s hard enough to get news these days without someone injecting politics; please don’t let this website become another left/right battleground.
“They bought their tickets. They knew what they were getting into. I say, let ’em crash”.
– Jack Kilpatrick
Way too political, Raf. Houston, we have a problem. It’s affecting everybody. Let’s do what it takes to fix it or mitigate it no matter your politics.
Duffy’s message was clearly aimed at Senate Democrats. Don’t take it or make it so personal, Raf.
Blame is to be directed 100% on the Democrat leadership for their ridiculous demands that are totally unacceptable. I for one am happy to do without ATC until the Dems cave to the will of the voters. Take a car or fly private outside of controlled airspace. Do a Ronald Reagan on controllers who balk at doing their jobs. They will all get paid, just as other furloughed federal employees are when back from another long vacation.
What a stunningly unenlightened comment. That’s not so much an opinion as a psychopathology.
Raf Sierra’s comments (both original and his response) are 100% spot-on! Of course the whole sad issue is political. Lobotomized partisan party hacks will display their allegiance to their “team” as a priority.
Duffy for a day? Let’s be real – he doesn’t have much power to do anything under these circumstances. This problem has been festering and growing for coming up on half a century. The root cause is after WWII we all sighed, relaxed, and stopped teaching our kids civics. Everyone got comfortable, and assumed that the politicians would take care of things, and said to themselves “they are all the same” and disengaged. It worked for a while mainly due to momentum, but the seeds sown in the 1980s are now bearing fruit for those that planted them. Sadly, there is no easy answer, and I fear things will get much worse before they get better.
‘Contract towers staff are still getting paid, so this threat to shutdown the NAS almost makes privatized ATC seem palatable, and maybe that is their actual goal.’
Intuitively spot-on. Distract and delude away from the big picture.
Described in P2025 and anxiously pushed by Big Business and Corporate greed, a takeover of all systems of a wealthy, functioning government using ‘other peoples money’ – the taxpayer – is the authoritative replacement being carefully inplemented for our struggling democratic form of government.
These microcosm events like shutdowns are just the continuing process of death by a thousand cuts from those who would watch this great country and its NAS and aviation sector fold to their will.
Good write-up Raf to expose a sliver of the incompetence and inability to govern by these sycophants to competitive authoritarianism.
When I started flying, I could go to the FAA station and was able to get my student pilot certificate. Now if I have to do anything, I must reach out to a DA and pay big bucks. The FAA has been heavily underfunded for years. Those are who complaining that Raf Sierra is pandering to leftist politics are the ones, who are heavily invested in this government and claim the will of the voters. The current government ran on making our lives better but instead have trashed our bureaucratic infrastructure and running a campaign of fear for the press, the people, and government. Duffy does not deserve any defense but should be ran out as quickly as possible.
Thanks for pointing this out. Just like pilots, controllers have to be in good shape to do their work safely and not being paid is a pretty damn big life stressor that will contribute to not being in shape to do that difficult work at an adequate level. The Secretary of Transportation is not a classic, neutral civil servant, but instead is a political appointee. Some will approach the situation in a non-partisan way and try to do what it best for safety and the nation as a whole, others will take a more partisan approach. It is a good thing to fairly assess to what degree any Secretary is approaching important life-safety issues more in one way or the other.
I appreciate Raf’s commentary. The situation is completely politically driven. Don’t you think that the NAS, the controllers, and Duffy are all pawns in a game the administration is playing. Duffy is doing what he is being told to do because if he doesn’t he is taken out of the game. There is one man who could fix the shutdown in an instant, but he doesn’t care about the pawns because he is the king.
Chuck Schumer et.al have made outrageous demands, not the administration who have repeatedly said pass the short term funding resolution and all the issues will be discussed.
Aren’t all budgetary shutdowns political?
Thank you Raf for a level headed op ed. We all know how the negative commenters would have reacted had Pete B made the same comment as Sean Duffy did, and those comments would have included irrelevant personal attacks on Pete.
Duffy is playing politics, clearly. He is a political appointee, it is his job. But I suspect it’s a different game. The longer term goal is likely to set the stage for ATC privatization and fees. Conservatives have been unable to get this through Congress for a long time. But if a ginned up crisis – while the budget shutdown is real, the shutdown/crisis language is hyperbolic – can push the public to believe that privatization can “solve” the crisis, they might get enough support to push it through. So watch for messaging about taking ATC outside the budgeting process. That is the tip of the spear for pushing through privatization.
Privatization WOULD solve the problems including staffing, equipment, and insulation from government politics etc. Other countries have it and the world did not end.
While I have opinions about the commentary, they are just that…opinions. Everyone has a right to theirs. Because it is just an “opinion” that created this whole mess.
Prior to 1980, lapses in federal funding did NOT shut down the government. Then President Carter asked his Attorney General for an “opinion”. And the government shutdown was invented…
No law was changed. No law was tested in court. Nothing, zip, nada. An AG gave his boss and “opinion”…and now we have the mess we have. It’s worth noting that others in the same administration disagreed with the AG, other lawyers who read the rules exactly the opposite. Even the AG who gave the opinion to Carter never envisioned that his opinion would likewise be interpreted the way it was. In other words, and opinion about the opinion!!!
And so we find ourselves in a mess that has no basis in law. No reason to even exist. We have controllers working their backsides off who then have to work another job to put food on the table. You can argue they shouldn’t be in that situation, but as the saying goes, “Let the one among you who has never sinned cast the first stone.” I’m sure all of us at one time or another, were extended further than we should have been, and didn’t plan for every possible financial contingency. Given that since 2019 the same CR has been approved by BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE 13 times, why would a controller suddenly expect this time to be different?
In my OPINION, fixing this problem goes far deeper than the current situation. Every other western civilization has figured out how to avoid government shutdowns. Yes, their government structures are somewhat different, but the point is, they came up with an answer that works under their rules. The US should be able to do the same, and find an answer that works under our rules. Period.
Until that happens, we’re going to have people on both sides of the aisle pointing the finger at the other side, and someone willing to make us all suffer to make their point.
And finally…here’s an article about the start of government shutdowns…just so you know I’m not making stuff up.
https://www.govexec.com/management/2022/10/time-lawyer-invented-government-shutdown/378935/
I (for one) can’t wait for Captain Duffy to put some real big boy action to all of his huffing and puffing.
Go ahead, Fluffy Duffy!
Shut the entire NAS down. Lets do it by Friday 12:00 Noon Eastern time. Lets stop all the posturing and blahblah and show America how powerful you are.
The US empire has declined to a uniparty run by two systems of capitolism. One is corporate capitolism (blue), the other oligarchy capitolism (red). Neither one is free market capitolism run by the voters. Corporate capitalism(blue) needs time to gain a return on investment, thus requiring basic national and global stability. Oligarchy capitalism (red)depends on chaos, unpredictability. However, both bow down to the financier in a debt based society.
Functioning capitalism is purely profit driven. The rewards may or may not get to the average working class via incorporating the profits for infrastructure, a fair wage, practical/safe working conditions, social needs such as free medical care, free education, retirement, etc. Everything a functioning, happy society needs as based on purely on profit and the goodwill of the companies or oligarchy.
Money is created by debt paid back thru loans. You want a loan for $1 million dollars? After whatever minimum credit qualifications are met, voila!…”money”, digits appear in your checking account allowing you to use those digits for purchases. No real money or assets within the bank backs that creation of digits. Its risk management partially backed by your collateral. As long as someone is willing to accept those million digits via a paper “greenback”, you can “buy ” whatever with those digits put into your account. Don’t pay, you lose your collateral.
Our country was founded by colonists. Colonists arrived on what became America by displacing the indigenous people… one way or another… to gain access to North American resources. Those recourses were the basic collateral that financed the Revolutionary War. Capturing followed by using those resources allowed for the Industrial Revolution including combining socialism where the government largely financed private companues building roads, railway systems, telegraph/phone, and used the taxes for the overall benefit of society first, followed with profits managed by both the worker (unions) and company leadership (capitalism)… this working relationship of socialism and capitolism with a diverse population of immigrants (talent) grew America.
But every debt based society declines and collapses when debt overtakes income forcing an expansion of resources for adequate collateral. Every debt based society demands via expanding colonialism, to capture needed resources allowing the global financiers to lend/create money for the empire. Since WWII, we have “colonized” or tried to colonize by regime change through war, Korea, various Europeon countries like Yugoslavia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Serbia… Africa with Sudan, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan Ahfiganistan, Iraq… to name a few, Cuba, Panama, Grenada, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Haiti, Dominican Republicto name just a few more in our hemisphere… Vietnam, Cambodia, Philippines, Burma now marymar…a few in SE Asia, currently at war with Russia in Ukraine, currently at war with Iran, Syria, successfully fomented regime change in Turkey, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Equador, Romania, Philippines, El Salvador, Columbia… and now wanting Venezuela’s resources via regime change… as we are now $38 trillion dollars in debt! in spite of all our tax payer funded wars never ending global regime change,
We have a uniparty masquerading as a two part system currently run by oligarchy, inciting global chaos in our attempt to further capture resources to continue to fund our capitalistic, debt based system that is in the verge of financial implosion.
Duffy is appointed not for his leadership skills but his loyalty to the oligarchy that pays his salary. Our ATC system, including its antique systems magically and masterfully guided by almost mythical masters of chaos management…aka controllers… are way down the food chain for societal tranquility … until someone over stressed, overworked, and not paid makes a mistake… and another tragic example of human carnage takes place that has colonizing DNA all over it. It doesn’t matter if the leadership is blue or red. Those designations are designed to keep the indentured servants fighting amongst each other, while the oligarchy finds ways of financing it’s regime changes of other countries for exploitation to pay the juice on America’s debt.
Welcome to 1984!
The Continuing Resolution that is stalled in the U.S. Senate expires November 21st. If this CR is passed in the next day or so, what happens after November 21st ?
CR? I’ll give you CR.
Here’s where both sides bit each other hard. Democrats tried to spice up the CR with healthcare and social add-ons, betting the GOP and the White House would blink first to dodge a shutdown. Instead, Republicans dug in, waved the “clean bill” flag, and let the standoff simmer till it blew up.
Now everyone’s choking on the fallout. Workers still aren’t paid, aviation and safety systems are stretched thin, and the public’s sick of watching Congress treat basic governance like a poker game played with other people’s paychecks.
This one’s a real blunder by both sides, pure mismanagement. What should’ve been a routine funding fix turned into a three-ring circus, and the only folks left holding the bag are the citizens footing the bill. Thank you for bringing this up.