• Airspace meltdown: Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy deflected when asked by CNN whether he is accountable for Friday’s nationwide ground stop that massively disrupted weekend air travel , saying, “I take responsibility for what was given to me by prior administrations,” and repeating his call for more funding to modernize dated aviation systems.
• On Capitol Hill: Top Democrats on two House panels overseeing the aviation industry say federal officials will brief them tomorrow on Duffy’s request for tens of billions more dollars in funding. President Donald Trump is backing Duffy’s call , saying today that more money is needed “FAST!” Democrats have signaled willingness to fund the department but skepticism about how existing allocations have been spent .
• Signs of improvement: Fewer flights have been canceled today and schedules are getting back on track after airlines spent yesterday re-routing passengers and shifting crew schedules in order to clear a backlog of flights.
An old copper wire at an air traffic location in El Dorado, Arkansas was being switched to a more modern fiber optic system when an issue occurred Friday, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said on CNN’s “State of the Union”.
Duffy said the copper wire was “obsolete” and he needed to have it replaced with fiber.
Some context: Defense contractor L3Harris has said it is supporting the Federal Aviation Administration in its investigation.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Sunday that the Federal Aviation Administration and the FBI are on site at one of contractor L3Harris’ labs analyzing the router that may have led to Friday’s airspace meltdown.
“What we’ve done is we pulled the router that was a problem, that was broadcasting all of this data into our network,” Duffy said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
“We have to unwind. Was this a technical install error or was this an issue with the router itself? When I have that information, I’ll pass it along. But that investigation is just beginning right now,” Duffy said.
L3Harris said Saturday that it was cooperating with the FAA’s investigation and that it “takes the nationwide ground stop and its impact on travelers, airlines and air traffic operations seriously.”
Duffy said in a social media post that routers from facilities in Texas and Arkansas were sent to L3Harris headquarters in Florida, for examination.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said he takes responsibility for the massive nationwide flight disruptions that occurred on Friday, while pointing to problems inherited from previous administrations.
President Donald Trump has just posted publicly about Friday’s nationwide ground stop for the first time since it happened, saying that it is “RIDICULOUS” that “much of our current air control system is 50 years old.”
While he has been active online in recent days, none of his social media posts were about the airspace meltdown and subsequent travel chaos until now.
As flights across the US ground to a halt on Friday, Trump published a lengthy post on his social media platform Truth Social about the American entertainment industry. The television and film industry “was MADE IN AMERICA, and must STAY IN AMERICA,” he wrote.
Yesterday, he posted a lengthy diatribe about a golf course in Washington, D.C , alongside several photo posts appearing to be from that site.
“Trash Island is currently the Worst Golf Course anywhere in the World, but the Department of the Interior is going to make it into the Best Golf Course anywhere in the World,” Trump said, referring to East Potomac Golf Links in Washington D.C.’s East Potomac Park.
The president also wrote, among other things, about California Gov. Gavin Newsom commuting death sentences , the stock market , and the recent cruise ship crash in New Orleans.
In a post last night, Trump published screenshots of an X post praising him for helping the son of Secretary of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, whose son at the time was suffering from a severe brain injury.
President Donald Trump, in his first public comments related to Friday’s nationwide ground stop, called on Congress to allocate funding to improve the country’s aviation systems.
“We have the knowledge and plan for the Flight Control Systems, we need Congress to give the money, FAST!” Trump said today in a social media post.
In a separate post, Trump said a new air traffic control system could be built “quickly and efficiently.”
The president also commended the work of the Federal Aviation Administration and placed blame on former President Joe Biden’s administration, claiming it “set (the air traffic control system) back years.”
Before this morning, Trump had not publicly weighed in on the airspace meltdown, though a White House official said Friday he was receiving “constant updates” on the situation.
The president over the weekend has taken to social media to discuss several unrelated matters, including his efforts to renovate a Washington, DC golf course .
The cause of Friday’s nationwide ground stop could have been routine maintenance on telecommunication lines, according to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, who is calling for increased funding to improve the country’s air traffic control system.
At a news conference on Friday, Duffy urged Congress to give “emergency funding” and approve $50 billion dollars to revamp the air traffic control system, increasing a previous ask for funding of more than $30 billion.
“What’s more important than having an air traffic control system that actually works?” Duffy asked, warning that more disruptions to air travel would happen unless the system is updated.
The current air traffic control system uses strips of paper with the names of flights on them to be handed off from one controller to another, and floppy computer discs and copper wire to handle communications for nearly a third of the system.
On Friday night, President Donald Trump held a phone call with GOP Sen. Eric Schmitt , where he pushed for Congress to pass legislation modernizing air traffic control, airport towers, terminals and other critical infrastructure as soon as possible, according to a source familiar with the conversation.
In 2025, Duffy and the Department of Transportation announced a plan to build a new air traffic control system by 2028 that would cost roughly $31.5 billion.
Since then, 69% of copper communications have been replaced by high-speed fiber, and control towers and radio sites have been modernized, Duffy outlined yesterday.
With new architecture, and with more funding, the Federal Aviation Administration could work with “the greatest telecom companies in the world,” rather than current contractor L3Harris, which Duffy said yesterday he was “stuck with.”
The ground stop is a “sign” for Congress to “lean in,” Duffy said. “Let’s make the investments and look forward to a brighter future in aviation, a safer future, a more efficient future in aviation.”
CNN’s Chris Isidore, Molly English, Kit Maher and Tori B. Powell contributed to this reporting.
The top Democrats on two House panels overseeing the aviation industry announced today that employees from the Federal Aviation Administration and Transportation Department will brief their staff on Monday, as questions swirl around the failures that led to Friday’s nationwide ground stop.
Monday’s briefing, the lawmakers said in a news release, will revolve around the Trump administration’s request for an additional $30 billion in funding to upgrade the US air traffic control system.
The representatives — Rick Larsen, ranking member of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, and André Carson, ranking member of the Subcommittee on Aviation — expressed skepticism about the ask, adding that they expect to hear from Federal Aviation Administrator Bryan Bedford by an early December hearing.
Larson and Carson pointed to the $12.5 billion passed by Congress in June 2025 to update air traffic control systems.
“Explain to Congress, again, why they need more money?” Larsen and Carson wrote.
That echoed calls for a clearer accounting from other Democratic lawmakers, including Rep. Greg Stanton , who also sits on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
The department is behind in its modernization effort, Stanton told CNN last night. “That is not the fault of Congress. They probably chose the wrong contractor,” he said, adding, “So, we have a lot of questions to ask about why they are so behind and why they didn’t test it enough.”
On Friday, all flights in the US were grounded for several hours “following a communication issue impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Centers,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced at the time.
Since then, Duffy has held two news conferences sharing more information about the ground stop. In a press briefing yesterday, he sharply criticized a contractor which was doing upgrade work on a dated system.
Duffy became Transportation Secretary in 2025, having served in the US House of Representatives from 2011 to 2019, representing Wisconsin’s 7th Congressional District.
Duffy resigned his congressional seat in 2019, saying in a statement at the time that he wanted to spend more time with his family ahead of the birth of his ninth child and that there had been complications with his wife’s pregnancy.
After this, Duffy was briefly a CNN political commentator, before joining Fox News as a contributor in 2020. He then co-hosted Fox Business’ “The Bottom Line” until he was nominated for his current government position.
Duffy initially found fame appearing on MTV’s “The Real World: Boston” in 1997. The following year, he competed in the network’s reality competition “Road Rules: All Stars” where he met the woman he would marry, fellow television personality Rachel Campos.
Before running for Congress, Duffy served as district attorney of Ashland County, Wisconsin, from 2002 to 2008. He is also formerly a professional lumberjack athlete and ESPN color commentator.
After flights nationwide were grounded for hours on Friday after a systems failure, thousands of flights were delayed or canceled, disrupting the travel plans of passengers heading into the weekend.
Here’s what we know about the cause of the ground stop:
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told reporters yesterday that upgrade work on an old telecommunication system could be a cause for the ground stop.
In at least one remote Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) location, Duffy said contractor L3Harris was doing routine maintenance to switch telecommunication lines from an old copper wire to fiber, which he described as “straightforward” work that has been happening across the country for decades.
Duffy also said it’s unclear whether there was a contractor error or faulty equipment during the switch. L3Harris said in a statement to CNN that it is working with the FAA to investigate the incident.
FAA chief Bryan Bedford said yesterday that while as many as 17 of 22 air traffic control centers were affected, none of the facilities “actually went dark.”
He explained that the agency received reports from various facilities about frequencies “going in and out” that required “them to switch between primaries and backup.” And because the agency couldn’t immediately explain why so many facilities were impacted, it issued a nationwide ground stop.
The department does not believe the outages were caused by a cyber attack or any “nefarious” activity, Duffy and Bedford stressed at the news conference.
“A lot of questions came in yesterday. ‘Was this a cyber attack? Did some foreign nation attack this network?’ And the answer to that is we don’t believe so,” Duffy said.
CNN’s Isa Mudannayake, Pete Muntean, Catherine Nicholls, Tori B. Powell and Akansha Singh contributed to this report.
