Five major airlines—American Airlines, Delta, JetBlue, Southwest, and United—have joined an airline trade association lawsuit to overturn a Department of Transportation rule that forces airlines to treat wheelchair users and their mobility devices with dignity.
The number of mobility devices damaged or lost was not even counted until 2018, when Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D–Ill.), a wheelchair user herself, pushed for tracking of those damages and losses to be required in Congress’ annual reauthorization of the Federal Aviation Agency. As my colleague Russ Choma reported at the time, airlines had pushed lawmakers to resist the measure. “When the public gets information on how often assistive devices are broken, it will force them to actually handle wheelchairs better,” Duckworth said.