United States

NATCA admits it did not request funds to pay controllers during shutdown

NATCA's President confirmed the fact during a hearing before the US Senate.

In a United States Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation’s Subcommittee on Aviation, Space, and Innovation hearing, Nick Daniels, the President of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA), admitted that he had not requested either the Department of Transportation (DOT) or the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to use any funds to pay controllers’ salaries during the US government shutdown.

In a hearing before the Subcommittee on November 19, 2025, Daniels, when asked by Tammy Duckworth, a Democrat from Illinois, whether he requested funds from either Sean Duffy, the Secretary of Transportation, or Bryan Bedford, the Administrator of the FAA, said that he “did not specifically have that request of them during [the shutdown], but it was loud and clear that paying air traffic controllers is essential.”

In response, Duckworth scolded Daniels for commending Bedford and Duffy, but not asking them “to pay” controllers.

“If the FAA can continue hiring and training air traffic controllers because of [sic] failing to do so would risk imminent loss of life or loss of personal property, surely there is a case to be made for paying air traffic controllers from reprogrammed funds or even donations from industry.”

Duckworth noted that if the Department of Defense, which Donald Trump, the President of the US, has renamed to the Department of War, “can use funds that Congress authorized and appropriated for [research and development] and not salaries and expenses, along with accepting a billionaire’s donation of over $100 million to pay military men and women, what stops the FAA from following suit in repogramming funds from accounts like the airport and airways trust fund […] or solicit donations from the industry?”

“Did you have a conversation about using those funds to pay the air traffic controllers, which I would have supported?”

In response, Daniels reiterated that he “did not have a specific conversation” about those funds, adding that he will put “my request on the record from now and in the future.”

“I welcome any chance to pay air traffic controllers for the work that they are doing, and they should never go uncompensated for the work that’s being done, or used as a political pawn in a political dispute.”

Duckworth rebuked Daniels, saying that what is happening “today, is that you are being used as a political pawn,” with the Senator noting that the hearing’s initial title was “The damage of the Democratic shutdown.”

“But what is happening today is political theater to use you guys as pawns to score points post-shutdown,” Duckworth continued, noting that she would rather talk about the data that Duffy used to justify the country-wide flight cancellations. “None of us have seen it,” she added.

Andy Kim, a Democrat from New Jersey, relayed some of the controllers’ feelings, saying that in phone conversations with air traffic controllers from New Jersey, “they were telling me that they felt like they were pawns [...], they felt like they were taken for granted.”

“It was really hard hearing just the emotion in their voice,” Kim stated, adding that controllers were angry about the fact that while they had to show up to work and not get paid, members of the US House of Representatives and the Senate, as well as the President, received their paychecks. “They are playing with other people’s chips,” he said.

While Daniels had not taken action to ensure controllers get paid during the latest shutdown, at least three – or two – bills were introduced in recent weeks that would ensure that controllers and other critical FAA employees would receive salaries during a lapse in federal funding.

In October, Senator Ted Cruz and, later, Representative John James, two Republicans, introduced companion bills, called the ‘Keep America Flying Act of 2026,’ to achieve that goal.

On November 18, members of the US House of Representatives’ Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, two Democrats and two Republicans, unveiled the ‘Aviation Funding Solvency Act,’ which would also ensure pay to controllers and other FAA employees during shutdowns.

According to Duckworth, US legislators should have caught up with Cruz’s bill. “We could have passed it, and you should have been paid,” adding that it was “unconscionable” that there was at least one controller suicide during the shutdown.