The Trump regime has begun firing hundreds of Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) employees on a busy air travel holiday weekend just weeks after a fatal mid-air fatal collision at Ronald Reagan airport in Washington.
Probationary employees received late night e-mails on Friday, and included personnel hired for FAA radar, landing and navigational aid maintenance.
E-mails began arriving after 7 p.m. on Friday and continued late into the night. More might be notified over the long weekend or barred from entering FAA buildings on Tuesday.
Other fired FAA employees were working on an urgent and classified early warning radar system the Air Force had announced in 2023 for Hawaii to detect incoming cruise missiles, through a program that was in part funded by the Department of Defense. The program manages long-range radar range protection around the country’s borders.
Due to the nature of their work, staff in that office typically provide an extensive knowledge transfer before retiring to make sure no institutional knowledge is lost, said Charles Spitzer-Stadtlander, one of the employees in that branch who was terminated.
“This is about protecting national security, and I’m scared to death,” Spitzer-Stadtlander said. “And the American public should be scared too.”
Spitzer-Stadtlander suggested he was targeted for firing for his views on Tesla and X.
The FAA has been facing a shortage of air traffic controllers. Among the reasons they have cited for staffing shortages are uncompetitive pay, long shifts, intensive training and mandatory retirements.
The Aviation Security Advisory Committee, a congressionally mandated panel, had been fired by Trump just before the fatal airliner and helicopter collision in Washington. That committee is tasked with examining safety issues at airlines and airports.
