Airport chaos worsens as TSA officers face second missed paycheck

NEW YORK — Andrew Leonard showed up at John F. Kennedy International Airport at 4:45 a.m. on Monday for his 7 a.m. flight to Seattle. Nearly two hours later, he made it through security and to his gate just in time for boarding.

“I fly out of this terminal all the time and this is insane,” said Leonard, a 34-year-old performing arts teacher in New York who was en route to Seattle ahead of a family vacation to Hawaii.

He is one of tens of thousands of travelers around the U.S. who are facing extra-long security wait times at major airport hubs such as Atlanta, New York and Houston due to elevated absences of Transportation Security Administration officers. TSA workers are facing a second missed full paycheck this week as a partial government shutdown continues.

White House border czar Tom Homan said Sunday said the administration would deploy Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to airports on Monday to help ease security lines amid the Department of Homeland Security shutdown.

DHS and TSA didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment early Monday about where or when agents would be deployed.

Homan told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that the ICE agents will be “helping TSA move those lines along,” including by guarding exit doors to relieve TSA agents so they could screen travelers. “We’re simply there to help TSA do their jobs in areas that don’t need their specialized expertise.”

TSA’s more than 50,000 officers have been working without their regular paychecks since the partial government shutdown began in mid-February. The shutdown comes as Democrats in Congress demand changes to how federal immigration enforcement operates in exchange for releasing DHS funding after two U.S. citizens were shot and killed by officers in Minneapolis. 

Hundreds of TSA officers have quit since the shutdown started, according to their union, the American Federation of Government Employees.

Members of the travel industry, including airline executives, have blasted lawmakers for failing to pay essential government workers during repeated shutdowns that have snarled travel.

In early 2019 and in late 2025, two federal government shutdowns ended shortly after travel disruptions escalated following higher-than-typical absences of air traffic controllers. Their pay isn’t affected by this impasse.

New York’s LaGuardia Airport was closed on Monday morning following a collision of an Air Canada regional jet and an emergency vehicle on Sunday night. Some passengers told CNBC they had switched to fly out of Kennedy because of the disruptions.

The Federal Aviation Administration issued a short ground stop at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey on Monday morning after air traffic controllers evacuated the tower because of a burning smell coming from an elevator, adding to travel chaos around New York City.

— CNBC’s Garrett Downs contributed to this article.