Airline execs, regulators often switch places

updated 2:25 p.m. ET April 17, 2008

WASHINGTON - What the airline industry wants from Washington it often gets, and no wonder. The people who regulate airlines on one day can become company executives the next — and the other way around.

Industry leaders who were once under the Federal Aviation Administration's authority now sit in top positions at the agency. Many former FAA officials and congressional aides have found lucrative jobs in the air travel industry or with its lobbying groups. One top official left the FAA two years ago to become the airline industry's top lobbyist.

Throw in millions of dollars in campaign and lobbying money, and factor in the airlines' importance to lawmakers' home cities and states, and it adds up to a powerful industry that even some of the nation's most frequent fliers — members of Congress — can be reluctant to tackle. Broad deregulation and multibillion-dollar government bailouts are among the industry's major victories in recent decades.

The cozy relationship with the government is under fresh scrutiny after two federal safety inspectors accused senior FAA officials of ignoring maintenance and inspection problems at Southwest Airlines, which is now facing a record $10.2 million fine. American Airlines last week canceled flights affecting 250,000 travelers to make safety checks, and Alaska Airlines and Midwest Airlines also grounded planes for inspections.

"The culture of the FAA has swung toward one that views the airlines as a customer and treats them as such," said Tom Brantley, head of the union that represents FAA inspectors. "The safety aspect, the oversight, has taken a back seat."

The FAA says that it hires experienced people who understand how airlines operate, and that its ethics rules prohibit officials in many cases from regulating their former employers.

Stung by the FAA inspectors' claims, Congress is promising air safety crackdowns.

A Senate Appropriations transportation panel is investigating, among other items, the revolving door between the FAA and the airline industry.

Just months ago, some of these same airlines, including Southwest, were drawing praise from Congress.

"On my many flights on Southwest Airlines, I am always struck by the friendly, good-natured flight attendants, agents and pilots that make up the employees of this airline," Rep. Mike Conaway, R-Texas, said in a May 2007 House speech.

Airlines have had few problems finding lawmakers to compliment them or help them. This year's presidential candidates are no exception, according to correspondence from the candidates, obtained by The Associated Press under the Freedom of Information Act.

Within weeks of the 2001 terrorist attacks, Sen. John McCain wrote to Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta urging him not to let his agency's focus on airline security distract it from a review of a proposed business deal between American Airlines and British Airways. Though an obscure issue for most Americans, international routes are the subject of fierce competition among airlines.

At the time, McCain was the top Republican on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, which handles airline issues. Mineta assured McCain he wouldn't rush a decision.

Sen. Barack Obama, then an Illinois state lawmaker, pressed Mineta to approve United Airlines' application for a $1.8 billion federal loan guarantee, writing that the economic health of Illinois was "inextricably linked with United Airlines' financial condition."

"Since September 11, United has taken bold measures to try to minimize the financial fallout. However, United needs a federal loan to help it overcome the aftermath of September 11," Obama wrote in the summer of 2002.

Despite pressure from Obama and other Illinois lawmakers, the government turned down that and other loan applications from United, rejections that forced it to go through bankruptcy proceedings to cover its debts.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton urged Mineta in 2006 to consider JetBlue Airways' application for permission to offer flights from New York's John F. Kennedy Airport to Cancun in Mexico.

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