American, JetBlue escape federal monitoring over unwinding partnership

American Airlines Group and JetBlue Airways will escape federal monitoring and a ban on future partnerships as they wind down a commercial operating alliance a judge had previously said violated antitrust laws. US District Judge Leo Sorokin in Boston rejected the US Justice Department’s request for a third-party to monitor the carriers as they dismantle their Northeast Alliance. The court can’t “implement ‘harsh measures when less severe ones will do,’” the judge wrote in an order Wednesday. Sorokin asked the DOJ and airlines to submit a revised version of the injunction by Friday. The injunction signals an end to the Northeast Alliance, which American and JetBlue created to compete more effectively in the New York City and Boston areas with Delta and United Airlines. American has said it plans to appeal Sorokin’s ruling that the partnership violated US antitrust laws, though JetBlue said in July that it will end its fight for the partnership to focus on a legal challenge to its proposed merger with Spirit Airlines Inc.<br/>