American Airlines Asks Gov't Not To Put Migrant Children On Flights
DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM/AP) — American Airlines has asked the Trump administration not to put migrant children who have been separated from their parents on its flights.
In a statement Wednesday, American said it doesn't know whether any migrant children have been on its flights and doesn't want to profit from the current immigration policy of separating families.
Their statment said, in part --
"While we have carried refugees for non-profits and the government, many of whom are being reunited with family or friends, we have no knowledge that the federal government has used American to transport children who have been separated from their parents due to the recent immigration policy, but we would be extremely disappointed to learn that is the case."
Fort Worth-based American and other airlines have contracts to provide travel services to the U.S. government. American says, however, that the government doesn't provide information about the passengers or their reason for travel.
In recent days several flight attendants have gone on social media to report seeing groups of children on their flights whom they believed to be children separated from their migrant families.
As the story is told in one post, the flight attendant and crew of an unnamed airline was disheartened to see a group of 16 children, approximately 6 to 11 years old, on a red-eye flight from Arizona to Miami.
American Airline statement regarding their disinvolvement from the practice of separating immigrant families ended with, "We have every expectation the government will comply with our request and we thank them for doing so."
(© Copyright 2018 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)