Apparently, Pete Buttigieg Was the Only Thing Keeping the FAA Together

Yet another U.S. airport suffered a potentially catastrophic communications meltdown this week under the watch of ex-reality tv douche and current Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. And the worst part? He doesn't even seem to care. What he DID care about was moving a painting of Jesus out of a basement at the United States Merchant Marine Academy. Priorities folks.

Amidst a near-catastrophic situation, Duffy made a splashy announcement about the picture just as the Federal Aviation Administration launched an investigation into an incident in which Colorado air traffic controllers directing flights across a large swath of the Western United States lost contact with pilots for up to six minutes when transmitters mysteriously went dark.

In the chaotic event, 15 to 20 aircraft approaching Denver International Airport lost touch with controllers until communication was reestablished using a frequency intended for situations when a pilot is in distress.

The Colorado blackout fulfilled Duffy's earlier prediction when he said, “What you see in Newark is going to happen in other places across the country.” As if he's not in charge of the only department that could STOP it.

Duffy shrugged off the lapses at the Newark airport on old technology and poor congressional oversight, claiming “Congress and the country haven’t paid attention to it.”

But I see why he didn't want to dwell on it. He had way more important things to handle—like relocating a random painting of Jesus at the United States Merchant Marine Academy.

In a video released by the Department of Transportation on Thursday, Duffy, a former Fox Business TV host, enthusiastically declared, “We are moving Jesus out of the basement.”

Despite the possibility of a catastrophic event, Franklin McIntosh, the deputy chief operating officer at the FAA, dismissed the six-minute claim as “over-exaggerated.”

David Riley, a retired air traffic controller who worked in Denver, felt differently.

“It’s one thing to lose track of one airplane because you can’t communicate with them, but to lose track of all of the airplanes that you had communication with? And from my understanding, in this situation, they still had radar coverage, but that’s like watching a car crash happen and not be able to do anything about it.”

Duffy told a Senate Appropriations subcommittee Thursday: “I believe the system is safe.”