The Department of Transportation announced the plan in September after calling the requirement an “unnecessary regulatory burden.”
Published November 14, 2025
The U.S. Department of Transportation is officially rescinding a directive requiring airlines to pay passengers if their planes are delayed.
The White House announced the formal withdrawal on Friday after first announcing the plan in September.
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The plan was first outlined during the administration of former U.S. President Joe Biden, a Democrat.
In December 2024, a federal agency led by former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg sought public comment on the plan, which would require airlines to pay between $200 and $300 for domestic flight delays totaling more than three hours, and up to $775 for longer and unspecified delays.
President Trump’s Department of Transportation said the rule would be an “unnecessary regulatory burden” in its explanation for withdrawing the plan.
Last month, a group of 18 Democratic senators urged the Trump administration not to rescind the reparations plan.
“This is a common-sense proposal,” said the letter, signed by Democratic Sens. Richard Blumenthal, Maria Cantwell and Ed Markey. “When an airline’s mistake imposes unexpected costs on a family, the airline should try to remedy the situation by providing accommodations to the consumer and helping cover the cost.”
U.S. airlines must refund passengers for canceled flights, but are not obligated to compensate customers for delays.
The European Union, Canada, Brazil, and the United Kingdom have airline delay compensation rules. Major U.S. airlines currently do not guarantee cash compensation for significant groundings.
The Department of Transportation said Friday that abandoning the compensation plan would “enable airlines to compete on the services and compensation they provide to passengers, rather than imposing new minimum requirements for service and compensation through regulations that would impose significant costs on airlines.”
new rules
The Department of Transportation also announced in September that it was considering reversing Biden’s regulation that required airlines and ticket companies to disclose service fees in addition to airfares.
The bill would also create new rules detailing the definition of flight cancellations that would allow consumers to get ticket refunds, and it also plans to reduce the regulatory burden on airlines and ticket agents by revising rules around ticket pricing and advertising.
The ministry did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
Al Jazeera also reached out to Buttigieg, the man behind the now-defunct policy, but did not receive a response.
On Wall Street, most airline stocks were still trading below market opening prices, but were trending higher in intraday trading. American Airlines fell 1.2%, United Airlines fell 1% and Delta Air Lines fell 1.3%. JetBlue fell 3.6% on the day. Southwest fell 0.2%.
The airline industry is still dealing with delays and cancellations caused by the U.S. government shutdown that ended Wednesday. There are still 1,000 delays and 615 cancellations for flights to, from, and within the United States, according to FlightAware, a platform that tracks flight cancellations around the world.
