With spring break in full swing, airline passengers continued to wait it out at major U.S. airports after President Donald Trump signed an executive order to pay Transportation Security Administration officers aimed at alleviating long security lines.
Trump's executive order on Friday instructed the Department of Homeland Security to pay TSA officers immediately, although it's unclear when the impact of that move will start to be felt at airports.
The signing came at a busy travel time of the year, with spring breaks at school districts and colleges and the upcoming Passover and Easter holidays.
Some passengers with very early flights on Saturday reported having little problem getting through airport security lines. But that may have been an anomaly. Others at some of the busiest airports wrote on social media that security lines were growing exponentially longer by the hour.
“We have not previously experienced checkpoint wait times similar to what we are seeing this morning,” Baltimore-Washington International Airport said in a post Saturday on the social platform X. BWI officials recommended travelers arrive four hours before their scheduled departure time.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said TSA personnel could get paid as soon as Monday, a relief for workers who have gone without pay since Feb. 14.
While that is welcome news to many, it remains to be seen whether that promise materializes on schedule and if it brings an immediate end to snaking lines at airports.
Caleb Harmon-Marshall, a former TSA officer who runs a travel newsletter called Gate Access, said the staffing crisis won’t improve significantly until officers are confident that they won’t be subjected to more skipped paychecks.
“If it’s only for a pay period, that’s not enough to bring them back,” Harmon-Marshall said. “It has to be an extended pay for them to come back or want to stay there.”
He estimates longer lines could linger for another week or two.
It’s hard to tell. Airports that had passengers standing in screening lines that clogged check-in areas or showing up far too early for their flights will need to decide whether to reopen checkpoints or expedite service lanes they closed or consolidated due to inadequate staffing.
A handful of airports experienced daily TSA officer call-out rates of 40%. Nationwide on Thursday, more than 11.8% of the TSA employees on the schedule missed work, the most so far, DHS said Friday.
Nearly 500 of the agency's nearly 50,000 officers have quit since the shutdown started, according to DHS.
Check airport conditions early and often, including official websites and social media accounts where airports share timely updates and guidance, according to experts.
Many airports on Saturday urged passengers to allow at least four hours for both domestic and international screenings.
“Wait times can change quickly based on passenger volume and TSA staffing,” according to an advisory posted Saturday morning on the website of John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York.
Wait times listed on the MyTSA mobile app may not be accurate because TSA isn’t actively managing its sites during the shutdown. On third-party websites that track TSA lines, estimated wait times could be outdated during the shutdown if they rely on publicly available data, experts say.
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Raby reported from Charleston, West Virginia.
