Airline industry is facing its biggest crisis ever, says flight attendant union president

The airline industry is facing its biggest disaster ever as Capitol Hill hits another impasse over a coronavirus relief bill, said Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA. “We are experiencing a crisis that is bigger than all the financial crises that the airline industry has faced since airplanes first took flight,” Nelson said Tuesday. It has been 250 days since the last stimulus bill passed. There’s been talks about a new Senate bipartisan $908 billion measure, which includes money for small businesses, state and local governments, and funding for $300-per-week unemployment benefits. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell shot it down, saying he needs to figure out what President Donald Trump will actually sign. “We don’t have time for messaging games. We don’t have time for lengthy negotiations,” McConnell said Tuesday after the bill was released. Nelson said the March stimulus bill should have taken the guesswork out of negotiations and writing another bill. ”[It] was the most transparent, most successful package of all of coronavirus relief, and it’s supposed to be the template that can be used for every other industry,” she said. Airline workers received financial support through the CARES Act’s Payroll Support Program which was signed into law on March 27. It kept airline employees on the payroll during the pandemic, but those benefits expired Sept. 30. Nelson said that as a result of federal inaction, thousands in the airline industry became unemployed. She added that lawmakers could take critical steps to help the ailing industry by authorizing another round of payroll support.<br/>