Trump Administration Plans to Gut Airline Passenger Protections
Last updated September 18, 2025
The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) plans to scale back or eliminate some airline passenger protection rules that were enacted or proposed under the Biden administration and earlier, siding with the airline industry in its push for fewer regulations.
Last week, DOT announced that it had scrapped a proposed rule that would have required airlines to pay passengers $250 to $750 for long delays or cancellations caused by issues under the airlines’ control—such as mechanical problems, crew shortages, or system outages. The rule also would have mandated free meals, lodging, and rebooking for affected travelers.
Also on the chopping block are rules that:
- Require transparent price disclosures that allow travelers to learn the full cost of a flight before booking
- Require full and automatic refunds when flights are canceled or significantly delayed and the traveler does not want to rebook
- Ban airlines from charging a fee for families wanting to sit together
- Require improved customer service for passengers with wheelchairs, especially when those appliances are lost or damaged
“The airlines are not just asking for minor tweaks,” travel expert Christopher Elliott warned in a recent column. “If they get their way, flying could become a one-sided game where airlines hold all the cards.”
But don’t the airlines want to keep their customers happy?
“Not necessarily,” Elliott told Checkbook. “The main goal here is to make money, not make us happy, and the way they make money is by getting rid of more rules. If they’re not stopped, we could go back to the days when we had absolutely no rights when we flew.”
DOT Following an Executive Order
Passenger-protection rollbacks began in April, when DOT requested public feedback to assist it in “identifying existing regulations, guidance, paperwork requirements, and other regulatory obligations that can be modified or repealed.” The request came “As part of its implementation of Executive orders issued by the President, including Executive Order 14219, ‘Ensuring Lawful Governance and Implementation of the President's ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ Deregulatory Agenda.’”
DOT received nearly a thousand comments, including a 93-page document from Airlines for America, a trade association representing major U.S. carriers, which included a “wish-list” of regulations it wants eliminated.
Airlines for America’s request claimed the Biden administration’s “activist agenda” stifled innovation and resulted in higher ticket prices. The airlines’ position: Passengers would be better served by competition, not regulation.
Consumer advocates argue that the U.S. aviation industry is not regulated by free-market competition; it’s an oligopoly, with only four airlines controlling approximately 80 percent of domestic flights.
“Americans may disagree on the proper role of government, but no one voted for canceled refunds, hidden fees, and zero accountability,” said William McGee, a senior fellow for aviation at the American Economic Liberties Project, a nonprofit that opposes monopolistic practices. “This agenda makes government of, by, and for lobbyists—not the people,” McGee wrote in a blog post.
McGee wrote he believes the DOT’s plan to modify or repeal existing consumer protection rules “is telling the airlines they can deny refunds, hide fees, and strand passengers without consequence.” This is happening, he noted, at a time when “most Americans are already dissatisfied with the state of air travel.”
U.S. Already Has Fewer Passenger Protections
Even if the rules enacted or proposed during the Biden administration remain—and they likely won’t—the U.S. still lags far behind much of the world regarding passenger rights. Canada, the United Kingdom, and the European Union have far more passenger-friendly laws.
The U.S. doesn’t have even a "Passenger Bill of Rights,” a law first proposed here in 2007 that would spell out what airlines must do for customers when things go wrong. For example, in the European Union, if you’re booked on a flight that arrives more than three hours late and the delay was the airline’s fault, you can claim compensation of up to 650 euros.
“In America, we largely let airlines police their own passenger protections, and we all know how well that has worked—or rather has not worked, in meltdown after meltdown after meltdown that left people stranded and paying out of pocket,” McGee wrote in a recent article for Frommer’s.
Passengers flying to Europe on U.S. carriers are treated better in the event of a problem than they would be on domestic flights, thanks to strong customer service regulations in those countries that apply to all flights that land in or depart from Europe, including connections.
U.S. airlines claim they’d be forced to raise ticket prices if required to provide passengers with the same rights as their European counterparts. Elliott doesn’t buy that: Europe’s airline market “remains fiercely competitive, with budget carriers thriving under the current compensation system,” he told Checkbook.
According to a report from AirHelp, a company that assists passengers in filing airline compensation claims, U.S. airlines could provide the same compensation protection as their European counterparts for less than $1 per passenger. In a recent AirHelp survey, 26 percent of Americans said they’d pay $10 to $20 extra for their tickets if it meant they’d be compensated for a cancellation or long delay.
Price Transparency Rule Also at Risk
Consumer advocates, including Checkbook, believe you have the right to transparent pricing for all your purchases. The airlines prefer opaque pricing—showing the base ticket prices upfront and the cost of extras, such as checked luggage or seat selection, near the end of the booking process—making it difficult to compare the actual cost of a flight across airlines.
A DOT rule issued during the Biden administration required “ancillary” fees—extra costs for baggage, canceling a reservation, or changing a reservation—to be displayed alongside ticket prices. The rule did not limit how much the airlines could charge for these add-ons; it simply required upfront disclosure. DOT said this information would save airline passengers $500 million a year.
As Checkbook previously reported, the industry sued, claiming that “all-in pricing” would cost millions of dollars for website updates. An appeals court has temporarily blocked the disclosure rule, but A4A now wants DOT to repeal it, claiming the department never had the authority to issue the rule.
Another Airline-Industry Objective: Hiding Their Performance Data
The airlines also want to limit the performance statistics that DOT collects and publishes each month. The department’s Air Travel Consumer Report currently tracks flight delays, cancellations, consumer complaints, mishandled baggage, bumping, and animal incidents.
This data is the only yardstick available to track industry performance, which helps travelers make more informed decisions when choosing an airline, and encourages carriers to improve their customer service. Without the Air Travel Consumer Report, you’d never know that American Airlines flights arrived on time only 65.8 percent of the time in June (the latest DOT report available), while Alaska Airlines (72.6 percent), Southwest Airlines (71.1 percent), and United Airlines (71.1 percent) did significantly better.
“Without accurate data, there’s no way for passengers or the DOT to hold the airlines accountable,” said John Breyault, a vice president at the nonprofit National Consumers League and a former member of DOT’s Aviation Consumer Protection Advisory Committee. “If DOT does what the industry wants, they’d be adopting a ’trust, but don’t verify’ approach to the airlines. This is unacceptable for passengers, and it should be unacceptable to Congress, too.”
Looking Ahead
The Department of Transportation is expected to follow the president’s directive and either eliminate or weaken many of the consumer protection rules implemented by the Biden administration.
The DOT’s Automatic Refund Rule is the most immune to change, since it resulted from a law passed by Congress. Even so, DOT has indicated it plans to review it.
As Checkbook previously reported, the rule details what airlines must do when your flight is canceled or “significantly changed” for any reason and you don’t want to be rebooked on another flight. The airline must automatically refund the full fare (including any extras, such as baggage fees), unless you choose to accept another form of compensation, such as points or travel vouchers.
“Significant changes” to a flight include departure or arrival times that are different by more than three hours domestically and six hours internationally; departures or arrivals from a different airport; increases in the number of connections; instances where passengers are downgraded to a lower class of service; or connections at different airports or flights on different planes that are less accessible or accommodating to a person with a disability.
Will unhappy customers push back and demand better treatment? Will the airlines respond?
“They will not do anything to protect passengers unless Congress makes them,” Pete Buttigieg, the Biden administration's transportation secretary, told CNN.
Contributing editor Herb Weisbaum (“The ConsumerMan”) is an Emmy award-winning broadcaster and one of America's top consumer experts. He has been protecting consumers for more than 40 years, having covered the consumer beat for CBS News, The Today Show, and NBCNews.com. You can also find him on Facebook, Blue Sky, X, Instagram, and at ConsumerMan.com.