North American pilots look to Trump’s “America First “ to revoke Norwegian Air permit

The Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) and the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, together with members of congress, will be looking to President Trump to revoke the permit issued to Norwegian Air International (NAI), a subsidiary of Norwegian Air Shuttle (NAS), to fly to the United States. They believe that President Trump will side with the unions over what they see as valid concerns.
The principal bone of contention is that NAI is seen as “flag of convenience” and a carrier established in Ireland to sidestep labor laws and to pay pilots a reduced wages, in contravention of the Open Skies agreement with Norway and the European Union (EU).
Airline, airport and travel executives had a meeting scheduled with President Trump at The White House on February 9, but ALPA, which represents some 55,000 American and Canadian pilots was not invited. However, the union will still be looking to President Trump’s administration to reverse the permit issued by the US Department of Transport (DOT) last December. Later that month, 102 members of Congress signed a bipartisan letter to then President-elect Trump objecting strongly to what they considered was a “grievously wrong decision.”
Last month, on January 12, ALPA joined forces with the Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO, the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, SWAPA and the Allied Pilots Association, and petitioned the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to review the DOT’s action.
According to Alpa president, Tim Canoll: “Our members noticed when President Trump has used this strong, positive rhetoric with regard to labor issues. It really encourages us and gives us hope that this president gets our issues. There’s a great deal of trust in our democratic system and a great deal of trust that this president will fulfill his promises.”
From President Trump’s perspective, “America First” may not work in ALPA’s favor as, according to White House press secretary Sean Spicer when asked about the dispute over NAI, the Trump administration is happy with the NAI permit. “On the case of Norwegian, my understanding, if I’m correct, [is] that there is a deal in which they’re having 50 percent of the crews and the pilots [be] American-based. They’re flying Boeing planes. There is a huge economic interest that America has in that deal right now. I don’t want to get ahead of the President on that. But just to be clear, when you’re talking about U.S. jobs, both in terms of the people who are serving those planes and the [people] building those planes—that’s a very big difference.”