DHS is reportedly warning United Airlines to prepare for the potential shutdown of Customs processing at Newark Liberty International Airport, a move that would create aviation chaos in order to score political points. This is another foolish idea from an administration that is rapidly losing public trust and confidence, even from those that once supported it.
DHS Threat To Shut Down Customs At Newark Would Be Aviation Madness
The Department of Homeland Security has reportedly warned that it may stop processing international passengers and cargo at Newark (EWR), a key United Airlines transatlantic gateway, as part of the Trump administration’s pressure campaign against sanctuary jurisdictions.
DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin said the administration may soon halt the processing of international travelers and cargo at Newark because local law enforcement in Northern New Jersey is not “cooperating” with federal immigration enforcement and failing to control protests over the conditions of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities near Newark Airport.
On Fox & Friends, Mullin warned:
“If things don’t change, we’re going to have to make this step pretty quick.”
He added:
“That may effect international flights coming in and out of their airport because I’m going to have to pull Customs and Border Protection officers out of being able to process international flights and put them helping our ICE agents. By the way, if you can’t process international flights because Customs is closed, you can’t obviously process international flights coming in from out of country.”
While the DHS won’t “halt flights” an international flight cannot land at Newark if there are no agents there to process inbound passengers:
“We are not going to halt the flights, we won’t be able to process them because we won’t have officers there. We will have to pull out our Customs and Border Patrol officers that process these flights and put them in these facilities to help protect our employees coming out to work.”
It appears now more than ever that Mullin’s threat to suspend customs and border procedures at major U.S. gateways was not an empty threat. He seems to think that these agents must be pulled from airports and reassigned to detention facilities in order to “protect” other federal employees from protestors and that the problem is particularly acute near Newark at the Delaney Hall facility, where protests have grown violent due to perceived inhumane facilities there.
Of course, such a move would not just punish state and local politicians in the Garden State. It would punish airline workers, cargo operators, business travelers, tourists, hotels, restaurants, convention centers, connecting passengers, and Americans returning home to red states…
It would also cripple one of the most important international gateways in the United States.
Newark is major United hub and a critical New York-area gateway. If CBP processing at Newark were halted or materially reduced, international flights could not land at Newark assent a technical step for processing elsewhere.
You cannot just tell United, “Use another airport.” That is not how airline networks work…
This Would Break United’s Newark Hub
United has built Newark into a massive international hub. Its transatlantic network depends on the ability to bring passengers into Newark, clear them through Customs, and connect them onward across the United States.
A traveler flying from Frankfurt to Cleveland via Newark? Sorry. A passenger from Tel Aviv to West Palm Beach via Newark? Good luck.
Remove Customs processing, and you do not just inconvenience United. You break the hub and exacerbate the economic problem already unleashed.
Flights would have to be canceled, rerouted, or delayed. Crews would be displaced. Aircraft rotations would be disrupted. Connections would fall apart. Cargo would be delayed. Passengers would face longer routings and higher costs.
And for what?
To pressure local officials over immigration cooperation? That is a reckless way to run a country and not even the purview of state and local governments….immigration and border protection is a federal function and local law enforcement officers cannot end non-violent protests over squalid detention facility conditions (hello First Amendment).
The Contingency Planning Sounds Enormous
There is also an unverified but highly-detailed claim circulating on X that United has been told to prepare for the shutdown of some CBP processing hubs (even beyond Newark) on or about July 25, after the World Cup final.
To be clear: I have not independently verified this operational plan, and United has not publicly confirmed it. But the claim is detailed enough, and consistent enough with the Reuters reporting, that it is worth considering what this could look like.
The claim says United has been advised that the impact could touch an estimated 72% of its daily international arrivals, reduced to about 47% with “non-impactful” rerouting where passengers already had connections. The alleged mitigation plan would push arrivals toward airports like Washington Dulles (IAD), Houston (IAH), Las Vegas (LAS), and Guam (GUM), while relying more heavily on Dublin Preclearance for Europe.
The same claim suggests that direct international arrivals into San Francisco, Newark, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Denver could be curtailed, with Asia traffic routed through Guam unless already headed to Dulles or Houston, and Mexico, Caribbean, and South American traffic pushed through Houston or even Las Vegas for some western Mexico routes.
Again, unverified…and seemingly far-fetched.
But even if the details are only partially correct, the broader point is obvious: this would not be a small operational adjustment. It would be a massive and costly rerouting exercise.
That is not a serious way to run an aviation system.
Airports Are Not Political Hostages
I understand the federal government has authority over immigration enforcement. I also understand there are legitimate debates over sanctuary policies and how much state and local governments should cooperate with ICE. Local law enforcement also should not tolerate violence from protestors.
Have that debate, but do not hold international aviation hostage! Send in the National Guard if local police are overwhelmed and unable to keep order…but don’t send CBP staff, as if the folks who process international immigration are suddenly going to start repelling protestors with batons and shields.
CBP staffing at an airport is not a favor to a city. It is a federal function that supports national travel, commerce, tourism, cargo, and border processing. Newark does not receive Customs officers because New Jersey politicians have been sufficiently obedient. It receives Customs officers because the United States needs functioning international ports of entry for itself, which includes red states and the national economy.
Even Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has reportedly expressed opposition to the broader idea of disrupting air travel over sanctuary city disputes, though he’ll be quick to parrot anything his lord and savior Donald Trump comes out in support of.
The World Cup Timing Makes This Even More Absurd
The timing makes this even more absurd. The New York/New Jersey region is one of the World Cup host areas, and Newark will be a key gateway for international visitors.
The unverified July 25 date being circulated would fall after the World Cup final, which suggests even DHS understands how catastrophic it would be to disrupt international arrivals before or during the tournament.
But the same logic applies afterward! The U.S. travel system does not become disposable once the World Cup ends. International aviation is not a switch you flip on and off to punish your political enemies.
Will United CEO Scott Kirby finally have the courage to stand up to this administration and push back?
CONCLUSION
DHS threatening to halt Customs processing at Newark over sanctuary policies is one of the dumbest aviation ideas I have ever seen.
Whatever you think about immigration enforcement, Newark Airport is not a bargaining chip and United’s hub is not a pawn. International passengers and airline employees should not be punished because the administration wants to pressure local officials to do its job for it. If the concern is uniquely the violence of the Delaney Hall protests, President Trump can send in the New Jersey National Guard.
If even part of the United contingency chatter is accurate, the impact would be staggering: massive rerouting, disrupted international arrivals, shifted connection flows, and an operational mess that would ripple far beyond Newark.
The broader point is this: if DHS has a legal dispute with sanctuary jurisdictions, fight it in court. Do not weaponize the nation’s aviation infrastructure. This proposal should die immediately.
Just taxi the international flights to the domestic gates and open the doors. Not only one party can be cookoo, two can be cookoo at the same time.
Markwayne Mullin, the former cage fighter turned Cabinet secretary whose primary qualification for running the Department of Homeland Security appears to be a reflexive impulse to engage in Senate hearing pugilism, has threatened to strip Customs and Border Protection officers from Newark Liberty International Airport and redeploy them to stand outside a detention facility in New Jersey to glare at protesters.
Why? Because the governor of New Jersey has declined to conscript local police into federal immigration enforcement, which is, one might note for the secretary’s benefit, a federal function.
All this from the “state’s rights” crowd, who extol the virtues of federalism until the duly elected state governments disagree. Guess we’re all free to have an opinion, as long as it’s Donny T and the Thug Bunch’s opinion.
This is what happens when you staff a Cabinet with performance artists who owe their jobs to a seemingly endless capacity for self-debasement in the service of a petty boy-king: the performance is spectacular, the governance is nonexistent, and the passengers stuck in Frankfurt are not particularly impressed by either.