American Airlines Now Charging Fees To Non-Passengers

How the US airlines got their $15 billion bailout

The intimate ties between corporate America, the Bush administration and the two main political parties were illustrated in sharp relief last month by the speed with which Congress passed the bailout of the airline industry. Less than two weeks following the September 11 terror attacks the airlines had secured $15 billion dollars in federal money, with none of it going to the thousands of airline workers who have lost their jobs and seen their benefits slashed.

Only the day after the attacks, the airlines sprung into action. Their lobbyists converged on Capitol Hill to convince Congress that the industry needed billions of dollars. In fact, they argued that the very survival of America was dependent on the injection of huge sums of federal money into the airline companies’ coffers. Senator Peter G. Fitzgerald (R-Illinois), the only senator to vote against the bailout package, told the New York Times: “The airline industry made a full-court press to convince Congress that giving them billions in taxpayer cash was the only way to save the republic.” He described the airlines’ lobbying efforts as “masterful.”

The airlines have a powerful lobby in Congress, including 27 lobbyists working directly for the airlines and another 42 from Washington firms. Included among them are former White House aides, transportation secretaries and retired congressmen. Haley Barbour, a former Republican National Committee chairman, and Rebecca Cox, a former Reagan administration official and the wife of Representative Christopher Cox, a California Republican, were also on board for the airlines’ cause.

Linda Hall Daschle, the wife of Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, is a lobbyist for American Airlines. While reportedly avoiding her husband and Senate Democrats in her lobbying efforts, Ms. Daschle campaigned vigorously among House Democrats for the bailout.