House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries slammed President Donald Trump while discussing the recent chaos at Newark Liberty International Airport, saying he had ‘decimated the FAA.’
During a press conference on Monday, Jeffries took a reporter’s question about the recent delays at Newark Airport.
‘Well, it’s certainly something that I think we’re all invested in looking into, as it relates to the ability of the American people to be able to travel in an efficient way,’ the Democrat began, before turning his attention to Trump.
‘We do know that the Trump administration has decimated the FAA in a variety of different ways, and they’ve been doing this from the very beginning,’ he added. ‘They are breaking the federal government.’
Jeffries added that the Trump administration is ‘breaking the FAA.’
‘And whether the specific situation at Newark Airport has anything to do with that remains to be seen,’ he continued.
‘But it’s my expectation that the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee will look into this situation, and we should get some answers to figure out how to get it turned around.’
The conference came days after the massive delays and cancellations at the New Jersey airport began.
On Thursday, more than 500 flights in and out of Newark were delayed and at least 200 others were canceled, and chaos followed throughout the weekend. As of Monday afternoon, 172 flights have been delayed and 76 have been canceled on Monday.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy blamed the situation on poor technology in an X post on Friday.
‘The technology that we are using is old. That’s what is causing the outages and delays we are seeing at Newark,’ Duffy wrote.