On Thursday, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced plans for overhauling his department's system, particularly as it applies to s new air traffic control system, one that a press release from the DOT website says "will be the envy of the world."
"By replacing the current, antiquated system, the FAA will enhance safety in the sky, reduce delays, and unlock the future of air travel. This plan also ensures hard-working air traffic controllers have a system they can rely on and one they deserve," the press release also mentioned. This comes as there have been concerns with plane crashes and near misses, a focus from the previous Biden-Harris administration on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), as well as concerns at Newark Airport. Earlier in the day, Duffy also shared a reminder that this is his 100th day on the job.
Today is my 100th day as Secretary of Transportation.
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) May 8, 2025
We’re just getting started! pic.twitter.com/08eCM1AXHk
At the start of his remarks, Duffy stressed "how historic this day is," and that such an initiative for the FAA "has never been done before," as he went on to stress the agreement involved from many groups on the need for such a new system. Another clip shared by the secretary's X account further stressed unity and bipartisanship, as it tagged both Rep. Sam Graves (R-MO) and Rep. Greg Larsen (D-WA), the chair and ranking member, respectively, of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
According to Duffy, President Donald Trump was intent on the need for an overhaul right when he offered him the job. "And when he called to give me the job, he said, 'we're going to fix American airspace and our air traffic control system,'" Duffy said about the president. "He knew in November that this job had to be done!" The secretary also spoke positively of Trump as he dismissed concerns some may have about the difficulty, time, and cost of such an endeavor. "We are blessed to have a president who actually loves to build and knows how to build. President Trump understands the problem and he wants to fix the problem. He doesn't want to take this problem and pass it to the next administration, to the next secretary, to a next set of victims who could lose their lives in an air traffic incident."
This could very well be a reference to how the Biden-Harris administration left the second Trump administration with problems to fix, including and especially when it comes to the Federal Aviation Administration.
We’re not going to leave this problem for the next secretary or administration.
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) May 8, 2025
We’re going to fix it. pic.twitter.com/0PN6qD7938
Duffy further spoke about the president's involvement in a statement the DOT shared. "Under President Trump, America is building again. Today we are seizing a once-in-a-generation opportunity to build a brand new, state-of-the-art air traffic control system," Duffy shared. "Decades of neglect have left us with an outdated system that is showing its age. Building this new system is an economic and national security necessity, and the time to fix it is now. The unprecedented coalition of support we’ve assembled – from labor to industry – is indicative of just how important it is to this administration to get done what no one else could. The American people are counting on us, and we won’t let them down."
The president even called into the event, with Duffy putting him on speaker phone, as Trump called it "a great honor," and apologized for issues with terminals, but pledged they'd "get them fixed up." He even quipped that he was "going to do that in my first month of my second term, but my second term got delayed four years, unbelievably, so it would have been done."
Trump was also particularly forceful in calling out his successor/predecessor, given that "they spent billions of dollars, many billions, tens of billions of dollars to fix a system that was old and broken, and hooking it up to satellite when a lot of it isn't satellite and that doesn't work, and you know you guys have to suffer because of it, but we're going to do the right job."
The president was calling as Duffy was still in the process of announcing the plan. Just as Duffy had done earlier, Trump recognized those in attendance whose family members had lost their lives in the plane crash at Reagan National Airport that occurred on January 29, just days after Trump took office once more. "If they had a system in there, we wouldn't have had a problem," Trump shared. He also affirmed that "we're going to make [the skies] totally safe!"
Thank you @POTUS for your support! I couldn’t be prouder to serve in this historic administration.
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) May 8, 2025
America — get ready for a Brand New Air Traffic Control System 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/g08rdzKDih
The press release further stressed a need for such upgrades. "The plan addresses critical safety needs to deliver Americans a state-of-the-art air traffic control system. The FAA will replace core infrastructure including radar, software, hardware and telecommunications networks to manage modern travel. We have a system that is built for the past, we are proposing a system built for the future. The agency will equip facilities with better technology to reduce outages, improve efficiency, and reinforce safety," the website explained. There will be four components involved, including "Communications," "Surveillance," "Automatic," and "Facilities."
There's more specifics involved as well:
Critical actions include:
- Replacing antiquated telecommunications: with new fiber, wireless and satellite technologies at over 4,600 sites, 25,000 new radios and 475 new voice switches.
- Replacing 618 radars which have gone past their life cycle.
- Addressing runway safety by increasing the number of airports with Surface Awareness Initiative (SAI) to 200.
- Building six new air traffic control centers for the first time since the 1960s and replacing towers and TRACONs.
- Installing new modern hardware and software for all air traffic facilities to create a common platform system throughout towers, TRACONs and centers.
- Addressing the challenges that face Alaska by adding 174 new weather stations.
It wasn't merely that the Biden-Harris administration allowed for the department to use outdated systems to necessitate these "Critical actions," but also that they were focused on the wrong priorities, Duffy had revealed on Fox News just days before.
While it may be shocking to everyone else that "the system is so old and so antiquated," Duffy told Martha MacCallum that "it wasn't shocking to Joe Biden and it wasn't shocking to Pete Buttigieg," Duffy's predecessor. He also spelled out problems with the so-called infrastructure bill from the Biden administration. "They knew we had an old system, they saw the GAO report saying it was about to fail, and so, the largest infrastructure, Martha, ever known to man, in the history of the world, the infrastructure bill under Joe Biden, $1.2 trillion, they sent only $5 billion to fix air traffic control," with Secretary Buttigieg spending less than $1 billion on air traffic control. This is where DEI priorities come in. "Instead [Buttigieg] was focused on racist roads and changing the name of 'cockpit' to 'flight deck' or 'airman' to 'aeuronaut.'"
It was after the incident at Reagan that Duffy "started digging in at the FAA and realized it wasn't just one small part of the infrastructure, it was the whole of the infrastructure that had to be built brand new," with Duffy also calling on Congress to pass his plan.
Dear Lord https://t.co/jAbVkPD2OM
— Katie Pavlich (@KatiePavlich) May 7, 2025
You can watch the full event below, as shared by the secretary's X account.
We’re minutes away from history 🇺🇸🔥@SecDuffy is set to announce our Brand New Air Traffic Control System! https://t.co/U6sKvgcfe4
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) May 8, 2025
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