Norton to Press Airline Officials on Treatment of Customers at Committee Hearing She Requested, Tomorrow

WASHINGTON, D.C.—Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) said she will be looking to hold top airline officials accountable for recent troubling incidents involving airplane passengers at a Transportation and Infrastructure Committee (T&I) hearing she requested tomorrow, Tuesday, May 2, 2017, at 9:30 a.m., in 2167 Rayburn House Office Building. Norton, a senior Member of T&I and the Subcommittee on Aviation, was the first Member of Congress to request that T&I Committee Chairman Bill Shuster (R-PA) and Ranking Member Peter DeFazio (D-OR) hold a hearing on the violent removal of a passenger from a United Airlines flight. Since then, another incident involving an American Airlines flight attendant confronting a mother and her child over a stroller has raised similar questions about airline customer service. Norton in particular will press United CEO Oscar Munoz and American Airlines Senior Vice President of Customer Experience Kerry Philipovitch about the underlying facts regarding those incidents and what remedies the airlines have implemented since.

"The public has a right to be outraged by recent deplorable incidents involving airplane passengers," Norton said. "I thank our committee leadership for quickly responding to my request for a public hearing to investigate these incidents. It is vital that Congress use its appropriate authority to hold the airlines accountable to their customers, who have in recent years lost their leverage over an increasingly monopolized airline industry."

Norton was recently elected co-chair of the Quiet Skies Caucus, a group of House Members who, like Norton, are responding to concerns from constituents about intrusive airplane noise, particularly during the early-morning and late-night hours.