MAGA influencers are suddenly turning on United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby after an old clip about diversity hiring resurfaced online. But if you listen to Kirby’s full remarks in context, it raises a simple question: are critics reacting to what he actually said, or to what they assume he meant?
MAGA Influencers Turn On United CEO Scott Kirby…But The Context Matters
A clip circulating on X this week shows United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby discussing diversity hiring at the airline, prompting criticism from several prominent conservative influencers who accuse him of prioritizing diversity over merit.
The clip itself is not new. Kirby has spoken publicly for years about expanding the pool of candidates entering the aviation pipeline. In one interview he noted that the airline industry has historically been dominated by white men and that United wants to broaden opportunities by bringing more women and people of color into aviation careers.
Listen to his full comments in context and the argument is hardly radical. Hiring based on merit and expanding the pipeline of potential candidates are not contradictory ideas. The reality is that every airline pilot hired by a major carrier is highly qualified. Standards are not lowered simply because airlines try to recruit from a broader pool.
That part of the outrage strikes me as performative, not substantive.
But United’s DEI History Makes The Criticism Understandable
At the same time, it is not difficult to see why critics are skeptical.
As View From The Wing notes, United has spent years aggressively leaning into woke or DEI initiatives, including:
- supporting affirmative action in California
- explicit saying it would add a black member to its board of directors
- adding (optional) gender pronouns to name tags
- forcing a vaccine mandate on employees
Thus, the backlash is not entirely coming out of nowhere.
Scott Kirby Is Also Playing The Political Game
Another dynamic here is that Kirby himself has been willing to adapt to the political winds.
During the Biden administration, United was often portrayed as the most progressive airlines, promoting environmental initiatives, diversity programs, and the vaccine mandate.
More recently, however, Kirby has publicly praised President Donald Trump’s tariff strategy, even describing the tariffs as the opening moves in a long-term economic strategy.
> Read More: United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby Signals Support For Trump Tariff Policy
It is difficult to fault a major airline CEO for trying to align with the prevailing political zeitgeist. Airlines operate in one of the most heavily regulated industries in the world and depend heavily on federal policy ranging from air traffic control funding to international route approvals.
In that sense, Kirby’s political positioning looks less like ideology and more like corporate survival. He’s playing chess and I understand the strategy behind his moves.
But Some Decisions Still Deserve Criticism
Where criticism of United is far more justified is in some of the company’s actual policy decisions.
United was among the first airlines to impose a strict COVID-19 vaccine mandate on employees, a move that resulted in lawsuits and significant controversy among workers who sought exemptions.
More recently, Kirby’s enthusiastic praise of sweeping tariff policies has raised eyebrows across the airline industry and the larger business community, particularly among industries that depend on global supply chains.
Those are substantive decisions with real consequences for employees, customers, and the broader economy. They deserve scrutiny. So does hiring a board member primarily on the basis of race.
But an old clip taken out of context about expanding recruiting pipelines does not…
CONCLUSION
Scott Kirby is hardly above criticism, and United’s approach to diversity initiatives has at times crossed into questionable territory. But the viral outrage over a short clip about hiring misses a key reality: expanding the pool of candidates does not mean abandoning merit. Why doesn’t MAGA understand that?
Every pilot at a major airline still has to meet the same rigorous standards!
There are plenty of legitimate debates to have about United Airlines and Scott Kirby. This particular controversy is not a compelling one.
Even so, I think it’s a reminder that when you try to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one…
image: @scottkirby / Instagram
Last line says it all, Matthew. While it is important to ensure you aren’t angering the people you need on your side, there are also times where it is important as a leader to stick to your guns. That doesn’t mean speak out on every issue, but you need to be governed by principles when in a position of leadership. Scott Kirby doesn’t seem to have any.
What would libs of tiktok founder Chaya Raichik know about hiring the best person for the job? She has failed at everything, until she latched on to the one thing you can’t fail at: riling up conservatives. All you need for that is lack of morals
TBF a lot of the stuff she’s exposed has been absolutely scandalous.
The backlash is real. Kirby can’t be trusted. No values, just emotions masquerading as principles that change by the minute. How very woke, indeed.
Oh no… anyway…
I doubt Mr. Kirby allows any DEI pilots to fly the flights he’s on.
This is why MAGA is known as the “Woke Right”, because anyone who doesn’t scrupulously conform is pilloried and cast-out. It’s just as bad as the “Social Justice Left”; in fact, it’s worse, because MAGA has moaned ceaselessly for years about “wokeness”, and now they’re enforcing the same ideological purity tests, and cancelling anyone who doesn’t score 100%. Absolute hypocrites.
Everyone except for their leader….so far!
Good. This will keep MAGAts off of United. Now if we can keep them off of American, I will not have to suffer their inbred and triple-sex-chromosome presence.
AA appears to be their latest target, per Gary Leff s bit ago
“Why doesn’t MAGA understand that?”
I think it’s tough for them to make an arguement that isn’t rooted in racism or at a minimum, subconscious bias. We all know what Charlie Kirk said about boarding a plane.
Don’t call affirmative action and vaccines woke. These used to be common sense things in America. Only MAGAs talk like that. Are you a MAGA, Matt?
I imagine our host has his children vaccinated.
I certainly do, though not with COVID vaccines.
@Roger: I decry the MAGA movement.
But forcing untested vaccines on employees violates basic human rights. I got vaccinated and boosted and boosted again but that was my choice – and those who chose not to for this particular vaccine should not have been punished by losing their jobs.
Choosing someone simply for their race is not the way to achieve a colorblind society with equal justice under law. Race, sex, or ethnicity should not be considered in public employment, public contracting, and public education (i.e. the prop that UA wanted overturned in California).
Talk about common sense…
“But forcing untested vaccines on employees violates basic human rights. ”
I’m not defending what United did in forcing vaccines their employees — by no means whatsoever, but this just isn’t true and is a rather MAGA thing to say (to be clear, I don’t think you’re a MAGA person in the slightest, Matt, but I think the sentiment and talking point is very MAGA and lacking truth).
The sentiment also lends itself to why we have these ridiculous, unnecessary, and stupid measles outbreaks — that vaccine mandates violate human rights when there is an inherent greater good for humanity to mandate vaccines for preventable diseases on as many people as possible to protect those with weaker immune systems and to prevent mass outbreaks.
The reality is that, by the time UA forced employees to be vaccinated, the covid vaccines were some of the most tested vaccines ever developed on the planet by sheer volume of those that voluntarily signed up to test them and those that also voluntarily took them once widely available. Also among the most studied group of people since the data around the entire medical community globally was focused on the results of these vaccines — unlike any vaccine ever tested in history (pardon the hyperbole but it seemed apt).
The idea that mRNA vaccines just popped out of nowhere, untested, in 2020 is also equally untrue. They’d been around and tested in various ways for decades by the time they were rolled out en masse in 2020-2021.
Look at me hopping on to defend covid vaccines… must be past my bedtime
I think we can all agree about the irony of MAGA being so against the covid vaccine when their dear leader was the one that built “Operation Warp Speed” and took credit for it before rapidly shifting tone and drifting with the mega base.
The long-term effects of the COVID-19 vaccines are not known, even if any negative effects are highly unlikely.
I may despise Trump, but I’m happy that Jay Bhattacharya is leading the National Institutes of Health (and I also agree with him on how essential the measles vaccine is…).
And Ryan, you are banned, but feel free to keep posting your bigotry and I’ll keep deleting it. You’re a miserably pathetic troll.
Out of curiosity, do you think the lack of long term studies on the Covid vaccine should’ve prevented healthcare worker vaccine mandates?
Given the spread of the virus via the air, I’m pretty sympathetic to what United did. If you don’t want to work in a job that interacts with hundreds of people every day (During a pandemic…) and walk around crowded airports where there is ZERO mandate for effective masks (we all know now the cloth ones were worthless), then don’t work at a job that requires it. Go work for net jets if flight is your only skillset.
But just like healthcare workers that were exposed to the virus nearly every day, UA was mandating a vaccine that we KNEW would protect their lives longer than if they got Covid in many cases and would also keep their operation running vs being sick and it protected their customers from employees that interacted with hundreds of others daily..
There’s plenty of room for massive disagreement here — I get that — and with what UA did, but I am sympathetic to it given how airlines and healthcare were designed essential workers in different ways and the exposure that both workers had to the airborne virus.
But to your article’s point… UA has come a long way since mandating vaccines 🙂
@MaxPower: I do…I don’t believe in such mandates and I think that shielding these drug makers from liability was a huge red flag. That said, my wife got her vaccine very early in COVID and I got it too…it’s not that I am unsympathetic to United (I am, exactly for the reasons you lay out) and I even argued on the blog during that time this is a legal move by United and something companies can reasonably require, particularly for all new employees, but even for existing employees. I also mocked (and continue to mock) so-called religious exemptions. Even so, and increasingly as we move beyond the pandemic, I believe that COVID-19, which I had twice, was never a life-threatening issue for healthy, younger, folks. If you look at the co-morbidities associated with COVID-19 deaths, they point to obesity, diabetes, hypertension, and COPD being a deadly combo. Those are the people who truly needed the vaccine but the rush to vaccinate everyone with a vaccine we still do not fully understand may not have reflected the wisest public policy.
Fair enough. thanks for the thoughtful response. Great articles, as always
Pardon my myriad spelling mistakes above.
Vaccines aren’t “woke”, that’s for sure, but affirmative action had long passed its use-by date.
My my. The Maga influencers are blasting Kirby? The ” we will never forget ” should be best applied to the promises Trump made to get re-elected, having greater consequences to their agenda today. They only see what fits their narrative.
Off topic.. but do you still travel? It seems like the site has lost a lot of the review and first hand content that used to make it more enjoyable to read. Hopefully, you will begin traveling again and/or take the time to publish some posts about it. Thanks.
I travel all the time. I find these issues more interesting at the moment.
I will no longer be following this site. No need to bring politics into a travel site other than to promote an agenda and to stir controversy. There is enough of that on the web already. I wish you all the best.
Goodbye!
It’s funny, not going through the “Good Ol Boy” network is considered DEI and woke. Expanding opportunities for all is a bad thing. The people who are the ones pushing for the “Anti-Woke” and “Anti-DEI” are the most unqualified people around. Libs of TikTok is just a talking head just so that she can make a living off of rage. No qualifications or knowledge whatsoever. That is what MAGA stands for is rage bait. The head of the FAA has no Aviation experience. A majority of the cabinet are DEI hires. Although this post seems political, it’s not. Just stating that rage and ager fuels America right now, not logic and common sense.
Saying that you want people who have been denied access to have a fair access and chance is a bad thing. Some will say that they are hiring and pushing unqualified pilots, show the evidence!!!. Lets get away from the rage bait and talk about the future of Aviation, new planes, routes, seating configurations, etc….