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Travellers faced extensive delays at security checkpoints across US airports on Sunday, with officials attributing the disruption to the ongoing government shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security. Passengers at airports in Houston and New Orleans reported waits lasting several hours.
At William P. Hobby Airport in Houston, estimated wait times for standard security reached three hours early on Sunday evening, according to the Houston Airports website. The airport had previously warned on social media of higher-than-normal passenger numbers due to spring break. Throughout Sunday, the airport’s X account progressively urged travellers to arrive earlier, escalating from "early" to "3-4 hours" and eventually "4-5 hours" before flights, explicitly citing the partial government shutdown as the cause for extended screening times.
Houston Airports, which manages both Hobby and George Bush Intercontinental Airport, issued a statement acknowledging that the shutdown "can impact security operations day-to-day and shift-to-shift." While Hobby experienced significant queues, wait times at George Bush Intercontinental Airport were reportedly as brief as a few minutes during the same period.
Posts on X from Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport on Sunday said a shortage of TSA agents at the security checkpoint was leading to “longer-than-average” lines. The airport urged travelers to arrive at least three hours before their flights and said wait times could last up to two hours. It warned similar delays could continue through the coming week.
It's not immediately clear if the delays in Houston and New Orleans were happening at other airports around the country. Sunday's longer-than-usual wait times came on top of flight delays in recent days in places like Atlanta due to weather.
Agents with the U.S. Transportation Security Administration are expected to work without pay during the ongoing shutdown of the department, which began Feb. 14. Democratic lawmakers have said DHS won’t get funded until new restrictions are placed on federal immigration operations following the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis earlier this year.
Chris Sununu, president and CEO of Airlines for America, a trade group for U.S. airlines, in a statement urged Congress and the Trump administration to act.
“We are in spring break travel season and expecting record numbers of people to take to the skies. Airlines have done their part to prepare; now Congress and the administration must act with urgency to reach a deal that reopens DHS and ends this shutdown," he said. "America’s transportation security workforce is too important to be used as political leverage.”
Jessica Andersen Alexie and her two children, 10 and 13, were among the travelers caught in the long lines at Hobby in Houston as they tried to return home to New Orleans. They had been in Houston for the World Baseball Classic.
Alexie said they arrived 3 hours early to find a long line and realized they would not make their flight. While in line, she checked rental cars to see if driving home might be an option but couldn't find any available. She was able to rebook for a late-night flight and felt relieved to get through the CLEAR security line after about 3 1/2 hours.
When they finally sat down to eat, she decided to take another look at available flights, on the chance that others in line had to cancel and rearrange their plans, and found three seats on a flight that got her family home Sunday afternoon. When they landed at the New Orleans airport, the line extended out to the parking garage, she said.
“It was nuts,” she said. “It was crazy.”