Americans thought the pilot flying their plane was qualified.
Something scary is happening in the friendly skies.
And airlines got caught hiding one woke disaster that could get you killed.
Trump Ended FAA's DEI Disaster But Airlines Keep It Alive
President Trump moved quickly to crush DEI programs inside the Federal Aviation Administration and Department of Transportation right after taking office.
He understood the stakes.
When you're 30,000 feet in the air, there's only one standard that matters: excellence.
But here's what Trump discovered: government action alone won't kill DEI because it's become a full-blown cultural operating system across corporate America.
It doesn't just disappear when the President issues orders.
DEI goes underground, changes names, hides in compliance language and internal training, then quietly keeps doing what it was designed to do: eat away at excellence.
Major airlines proved that point this week.
Delta's Chief Legal Officer Peter Carter said in January 2025 that the airline is "steadfast" in its DEI commitments, calling them "critical to our business."
United still has its goal of ensuring 50% of pilot training graduates are women or minorities.
Southwest pledges to "recruit, hire, and retain a diverse and inclusive workforce."
American Airlines agreed not to impose illegal quotas, leaving plenty of wiggle room to keep DEI alive through other means.
These aren't hollow corporate statements.
Airlines have built entire hiring pipelines around diversity quotas that actively discriminate against merit-based candidates.
The Atlas Air Crash Exposed DEI's Deadly Consequences
The New York Post published a piece that lays out exactly how deep the DEI obsession runs inside airlines and why every time Americans step onto a plane, they could be placing their lives in the hands of someone sitting behind the wheel because they "checked a box."
Look, the Post did something nobody else would: they analyzed every pilot error crash since 2000.
The numbers tell a story airlines don't want you to hear.
Diverse pilots make up less than one in ten cockpits, but they were at the controls in two-thirds of fatal crashes.
Crashes don't happen often, which makes these six cases matter even more.
The 2019 Atlas Air crash tells the tale.
First Officer Conrad Aska, a black pilot at the controls, flew the plane straight into Trinity Bay near Houston, killing all three people aboard.
The National Transportation Safety Board found Aska's "piloting performance as among the worst" a check airman had "ever seen."
When faced with unexpected situations in the simulator, Aska would "get extremely flustered and could not respond appropriately."
The NTSB determined Aska panicked after accidentally initiating a go-around procedure and flew the plane into the ground.
But here's the kicker: Aska had four "downs" – safety violations that would have washed out any male pilot.
Instead, he received "extra training, specialized one-on-one tutoring, and a series of special concessions not normally afforded" other pilots.
The 1994 case proves airlines have been running this scam for thirty years.
Lieutenant Kara Hultgreen became the Navy's first female F-14 pilot, then died three months later when her jet crashed into the Pacific.
Navy brass immediately blamed mechanical failure and insisted training standards never changed.
Complete lies – a whistleblower proved it five months later.
Hultgreen failed qualification attempts that would have ended any male pilot's career but kept getting extra chances and specialized help until she passed.
The coverup playbook from 1994 is still in use today.
FAA Has Power to Stop This But Won't
The FAA could use its certification power to actually force merit-only hiring and expose what DEI has been doing behind closed doors.
Federal law makes it illegal to run an airline "without an air carrier operating certificate."
These certificates must "contain terms necessary to ensure safety" and can be revoked if the "public interest" requires it.
Translation: the government has leverage.
The FAA should condition operating certificates on merit-only hiring and verify compliance.
Carriers that resist will find litigation works against them because discovery will expose how extensively DEI has lowered standards.
Atlas Air remains unrepentant despite the 2019 crash.
Its website declares, "Equity and inclusion are deeply woven into our operations."
Most diversity disasters leave far-from-complete paper trails.
Training failures happen behind closed doors.
Near-misses can go unreported.
Crashes can be blamed on mechanical failure, understaffing or other politically acceptable causes.
The Bureaucrats Protecting DEI Have Blood on Their Hands
Want to know why DEI won't die even after Trump ordered it killed?
Because it's not an idea anymore – it's a racket.
Thousands of bureaucrats, consultants, and airline executives built their entire careers on diversity quotas.
They're protecting their paychecks, not your safety.
And they're doing it by hiding behind compliance paperwork and training programs that sound official but mean nothing.
Delta's chief legal officer gets paid big money to keep DEI alive.
United's training academy directors have jobs because of the 50% quota.
Southwest's diversity officers aren't giving up their six-figure salaries without a fight.
These people would rather you die in a plane crash than admit they spent a decade hiring pilots who can't fly.
Trump took meaningful steps shutting down DEI at the FAA.
But the same bureaucrats who created this disaster are now just moving it to the private sector where it's harder to root out.
They're betting Trump won't have the stomach to threaten airline operating certificates.
That bet depends on you trusting the system – even after Atlas Air, even after the Navy's Hultgreen coverup, even after unqualified pilots killed innocent people.
And they're hoping nobody notices the FAA has the power to stop this tomorrow but chooses not to.
The FAA needs to stop playing games.
Tie every single operating certificate to merit-only hiring with real audits – not the fake compliance checkboxes airlines are using now.
Make airlines open their training records to public scrutiny.
Force them to explain why pilots with four safety violations are still flying.
Treat DEI exactly like what it is: corruption that trades American lives for woke points.
Follow the money trail from George Soros-backed groups funding pilot "diversity" programs.
Bust up the consulting firms getting rich off airline DEI contracts.
And prosecute any executive who knowingly puts an unqualified pilot in the cockpit.
Because right now, every time you board a plane, you're gambling that the person up front actually earned that job.
The woke mob running airlines is fine with those odds.
Your family shouldn't have to be.
Sources:
- New York Post, "Airlines prioritize diversity over safety despite Trump's FAA reforms," January 2026.
- National Transportation Safety Board, "Atlas Air Flight 3591 Investigation Report," July 2020.
- Center for Military Readiness, "Double Standards in Naval Aviation," June 1995.
- Chicago Tribune, "Engine cited in fatal F-14 crash," February 1995.
