Top airline CEOs plead with Congress to restore DHS funding and pay airport workers. ‘Once again, air travel is the political football’

The CEOs of the nation’s top airline companies, including American, Delta, Southwest and JetBlue, are imploring Congress to restore funding to the Department of Homeland Security and embrace a bipartisan solution to pay federal aviation workersincluding airport security officers during the partial government shutdown.

“Once again, air travel is the political football amid another government shutdown,” the executives wrote in an open letter to Congress that was published Sunday online and in The Washington Post.

The letter, which was also signed by the CEOs of the cargo companies UPS, FedEx and Atlas Air, said that Congress should pass the Aviation Funding Solvency Act and the Aviation Funding Stability Act, which would guarantee air traffic controllers are paid regardless of the government’s funding status, as well as the Keep America Flying Act. That measure would offer the same protections to Transportation Security Administration officers tasked to provide security and to screen all travelers.

”It’s difficult, if not impossible, to put food on the table, put gas in the car and pay rent when you are not getting paid,”...