Public outcry vs. ‘public servants’: MN airport officials ignore community demands on Delta ICE flights, approve luxury lounge plan

If you, like me, are somewhere on the broad left – which is to say, from liberal to anarchist – then you’re probably constantly looking for ways to do something right now, to protect the vulnerable and fight back against this fascist, oligarchic regime. Doesn’t matter how small each opportunity may be, you remind yourself, because many small moves done many times by many people can add up to something great, right? You don’t have to do it all, you just have to do your part.

But if you’re among that sclerotic class of elected and appointed officials we call “public servants,” the very suggestion that you might do something – that you might fully grip whatever lever of power you’ve been handed – is downright offensive. Your job, you think, is to maintain balance, and that necessarily means doing as little as possible. This so-called public that keeps showing up to your public meetings with urgent demands? Annoying as hell. Unrealistic. They don’t have all the facts.

This dynamic – public outcry vs. “public servants” – has been playing out in blue cities and states for decades now. This week, I watched it play out on a livestream of the Minnesota Metropolitan Airports Commission's monthly meeting.

“The MAC,” as folks there call it, is the state-run public corporation that owns and administers the Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport and other small airports in the region. Commissioners are appointed by the governor and by the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul. For the past 15 years, those have all been Democrats.

On Monday, the commissioners unanimously approved a measure for a Delta Air Lines luxury lounge, minutes after a packed room of clergy, labor leaders, and immigrants rights activists implored them to delay approval until the airline accounted for its collaboration with ICE. Not only did the commissioners steamroll right over the pleas of people who have been on the front lines protecting neighbors for months, one of them lashed out in a condescending 4 ½-minute rant, baselessly claiming those assembled were “not paying attention” and “make up their own facts.”

In March, MN50501 volunteer and avgeek Nick Benson obtained video proving what he'd already suspected, that Delta had been flying migrant children and families captured in the region to ICE's prison camp for kids in Texas. The video showed 5-year-old Liam Ramos, his father, and three ICE escorts boarding a nonstop Delta flight to San Antonio the morning after ICE allegedly used the boy as bait to try to catch his pregnant mother. (The Sahan Journal now estimates 30+ Minnesota children and their families were sent to the camp.)

First reported here, the video got national coverage, including a long monologue by MSNow’s Rachel Maddow. Delta claimed (and continued to claim to me this week) that it had no way of knowing who was flying on its planes or under what circumstances, diligently avoiding answering the obvious follow-up question: Would they tell ICE to stop?

Benson and the group of community leaders tried to hold a press conference on a public sidewalk in front of the airport before they planned to deliver a letter to Delta's corporate office, asking for a meeting with CEO Ed Bastian. But the right beforehand, they got emails from the MAC, which I have viewed, threatening them with criminal charges if they did not follow the permit process for “expressive activity” – something Benson told me none of them could recall being asked to do previously.

They put the letter in the mail. A month later, they have not received a response. The Delta spokesman I talked to this week did not answer my question about when or if the group might be hearing from him.

Though Delta is not headquartered in the Twin Cities, it maintains a major corporate presence there and uses the Twin Cities’ airport as a flight hub. The proposal before the MAC this week was for a feasibility study for the construction of a 20,000 square-foot Delta One Lounge – a luxury waiting area only for Delta’s most-elite customer tier. Most Minnesotans will never step foot in it. The $1 million cost of the study would be paid for with a fee charged to the airlines, according to the commissioners, who did not say if the airlines would simply pass that cost onto customers.

So the group packed into the commissioners’ monthly public meeting to ask them for a little leverage. Would they please delay approving the study until Delta agreed to meet with them?

Benson is no stranger to these meetings. He’s been going since November, after he started observing ICE’s charter planes being loaded with shackled migrants from the roof of an airport parking lot. He keeps meticulous records and has regularly urged the commissioners to do more. They generally point to a federal court ruling that public-use airports can't prevent ICE flights from landing and leave it at that.

Two airport union leaders spoke first, about chronic safety issues and low pay affecting their largely immigrant members, some of whom were captured by ICE during the occupation. “I wish you as the MAC would be on our side,” said Osman Sheikh, an airport worker with SEIU Local 26. “It seems like you are choosing to spend time helping Delta but not helping your employees.”

Lutheran pastor James Erlandson told the commissioners he was among 100 faith leaders arrested at the airport in January, “while praying for Delta to find the courage to use their power and speak out ... before any of us even knew that they were transporting children.”

“Just treatment for immigrant families and workers and our neighbors detained by ICE should take priority over profits,” he told them.

Benson spoke last, and his 3-minute speech is worth watching in full.

“It’s tremendously frustrating to see injustice being carried out in our community, with those of you in power being unable to respond in a meaningful way,” he said. “Fortunately, commissioners, you have a chance in a few minutes to act courageously, to do the right thing, to stand up, push back and do something that you can be proud of ... Tell Delta that you’re not going to approve funding for that new lounge until they sit down for a meeting with the community stakeholders here – the one that we requested three weeks ago – so we can figure out what Delta’s going to do to restore the faith and trust of Minnesota travelers.”

The airlines had real power here, he told them. In 2018, major airlines and their unions banded together and demanded the first Trump administration to stop transporting migrant kids they'd separated from their families onto their planes. Trump ended the family separation policy the same day. (Delta, interestingly, signed onto the demand afterward.)

When he was done, they moved onto to other business. Then, just before the vote, commission chair James Lawrence somewhat apologetically told the group the lounge was part of their attempt to attract more international travelers, would help the local economy, and “has been done with careful judgment on our part.”

Then his fellow commissioner, Richard Ginsberg, who has been on the MAC board for nearly a decade, decided to get a few things of his chest. He had time in his day to lecture the ungrateful folks assembled there, but apparently not enough time to take the gum out of his mouth. If you want to watch his full remarks, they are here at the 28:25 mark, but this was the vibe:  

Ginsberg reiterated that they are limited in what they can do about immigration by federal law, though he did not explain what that had to do with approving a study for a luxury lounge. He told the airport workers the MAC had done a lot for them, like...meeting with them and...listening! He defended Delta against a stray comment from the pastor, who mistakenly said it was the airline who had threatened legal action over the presser. In doing so, Ginsberg himself misspoke, saying the MAC hadn't either, when they definitely had.

“But when we’re being attacked as shills for an airline” – no one had called them that – “it’s not true, and it doesn’t really create this unity that we like to see,” he said.

“Facts matter,” he told the volunteers who have counted 3,504 of their shackled neighbors be loaded onto 131 flights since Oct. 1, “but on this stuff, it’s just gone a little too far.”

And with that, the commissioners unanimously approved the study. Another day in America. Balance of power maintained. Business as usual. The commissioners moved on to an update on construction at Concourse G. Delta continued to dodge questions. ICE continued to capture people, because despite major news outlets leaving, their occupation of the region continues.

And Benson went back to the roof of the airport parking garage. He counted 17 shackled neighbors being taken away.

Thank you for reading. I am a former Washington Post staff writer and, as far as I know, the only journalist in America covering ICE flights full time. I am committed to keeping this reporting non-paywalled, but if you are able, please sign up for a paid subscription or send me a one-time tip, so I can continue to focus on this important work. –Gillian