Swansenreport

Spirit Airlines Is Dead. Wisconsin’s Sean Duffy Says Biden and Buttigieg Killed It.

Spirit Airlines ceased all operations Saturday morning, stranding passengers across the country and putting more than 14,000 employees out of work — and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, Wisconsin’s own, wasted no time pointing the finger directly at Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, and Senator Elizabeth Warren.

At a press conference at Newark Liberty International Airport, Duffy said the collapse was a direct consequence of the Biden administration’s decision to block a proposed $3.8 billion merger between JetBlue and Spirit in 2024. “There was a proposed merger between JetBlue and Spirit, and Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg, along with the Biden DOJ, decided that they did not want that merger to take place,” Duffy said. “And at the time, the Biden and Buttigieg DOJ bragged and said, as they canceled the option for this merger, that this was a victory for U.S. travelers who deserve lower prices and better choices.” RedState

The irony is brutal and well-documented. In March 2024, immediately after the merger fell apart, Warren posted on X: “I’ve warned for months that a JetBlue-Spirit merger would have led to fewer flights and higher fares. This is a Biden win for flyers!” Warren and eight House Democrats — including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — had written to Buttigieg urging him to block the deal, calling JetBlue’s arguments “Astroturf.” The Gateway Pundit

Duffy’s DOT moved quickly to coordinate relief. American Airlines, United, Delta, JetBlue, Southwest, Allegiant, Frontier, Avelo, and Breeze all agreed to assist stranded Spirit passengers, with the four major carriers capping rebooking fares at around $200 for customers who can show proof of a Spirit reservation. American Airlines and Delta additionally committed to keeping fares low on high-volume Spirit routes. Fox News

To be fair, the full story has a few more layers. The merger was ultimately blocked not by the Biden administration alone, but by a federal judge — appointed by President Ronald Reagan — who ruled the deal violated antitrust law. And fuel analyst Patrick De Haan noted that Spirit’s restructuring plan assumed jet fuel at about $2.24 a gallon, while wartime prices had pushed the cost to roughly $4.51 a gallon by late April — a figure Spirit simply could not survive. The Gateway Pundit

But the political math is hard to escape. The Biden team killed the merger while celebrating it as a consumer win. The airline subsequently filed for bankruptcy, failed to secure a government bailout, and is now liquidating. Fourteen thousand workers are looking for new jobs. As Duffy put it: “Yet another mess the traveling public has to inherit thanks to the radical policies of Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg. In blocking the JetBlue-Spirit merger in 2024, they turned their backs on the American consumer and our great aviation workforce.” Fox News

History, as Duffy noted, has rendered its verdict.