Some TSA workers facing difficult choice: Find a job that will pay them or report to a job that won't
TSA reports many workers can no longer handle the financial hardship of working without pay as the partial government shutdown drags on; Laura Ingle reports.
As the longest partial government shutdown in U.S. history continues, Southwest Airlines staffers at Oakland International Airport made extra room at their lunch table for Transportation Security Administration workers recently, sharing a special meal with them.
On Tuesday, Southwest staffers invited TSA workers at the California hub to join them for a BBQ lunch held in honor of the carrier’s founder Herb Kelleher, who recently passed away at age 87, TravelPulse reports. According to the outlet, the gesture was greatly appreciated by the furloughed government workers, who have gone without pay for over 30 days.
The gesture was greatly appreciated by the furloughed government workers, who have gone without pay for over 30 days. (iStock)
One Southwest staffer commented that Kelleher, who was famously generous, wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.
"Herb always believed in servant leadership,” airline spokesman Steve Bernhardt told KRON of the news. "What better way to celebrate than to show our appreciation not only to our employees, but to the TSA agents who work very hard for us on a daily basis.”
A Homeland Security exec echoed similar sentiments, musing that it’s often the smallest gestures that can make the biggest difference.
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"I can't tell you how much it means to our officers, when you wake up sometimes, literally at 1:30 in the morning and you know how much you're appreciated," said David Von Damm, Federal Security Director for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, as per TravelPulse. "Like the folks at Southwest are showing us today, it just means a world of difference."
"It is a difficult time. But I tell you what, it's times like this that bring people together,” he continued. “Everyone here signed up for the mission of TSA, to keep our traveling public safe and secure,” And, I could not be more proud, because that's exactly what the men and women of TSA and my officers here at Oakland airport are doing everyday."
One thoughtful teen from Wichita, Kan. did a similar good deed last week, when she surprised the TSA staffers at her local airport with 20 pizzas and multiple orders of breadsticks, too.
"When I first realized that the government had been shutdown and that the TSAs in the airport weren't getting paid, I thought maybe it would be nice to just get them lunch," 15-year-old Aislynn Buckner said.
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