TSA worker pay won’t eliminate airport woes overnight, experts say

Transportation Security Administration officers may receive their first complete paychecks in over six weeks as early as Monday following President Donald Trump’s executive order directing immediate payment. The order, signed Friday, instructs the Homeland Security secretary to pay TSA workers who have been working without compensation since February 14.

Despite this positive development, travel experts and labor representatives caution that the extensive security lines plaguing U.S. airports won’t disappear immediately. The lingering effects could continue into next week or beyond while workers await back pay, airports reassess staffing levels, and Congress remains deadlocked over Department of Homeland Security funding.

“Until checks are actually in hands, we might still see some of these staffing issues,” said Eric Rosen, director of travel content for The Points Guy. “But the executive order is a bit of good news, I think, for both TSA officers as well as the flying public. Hopefully, the money starts flowing quickly and people can get back to work.”

The timing is particularly critical as spring break travel season approaches for school districts and colleges nationwide, along with increased travel around holidays like Passover and Easter.

The record-long partial government shutdown has significantly impacted airport operations across the country. As the impasse continued, thousands of TSA officers called out from scheduled shifts, resulting in hourslong wait times and closed express lanes at major airports in Houston, Atlanta, New Orleans, New York, and other cities.

Trump’s executive order came after House Republicans rejected a Senate-passed bill that would have funded the TSA, U.S. Coast Guard, and Federal Emergency Management Agency, but excluded Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol.

Caleb Harmon-Marshall, a former TSA officer who runs the Gate Access travel newsletter, emphasized that officers are struggling with mounting bills, accumulating debt, and facing late fees and interest charges. He noted that while immediate payment is welcome, officers need assurance of continued compensation.

“Hopefully, with this executive order, the relief does come,” Harmon-Marshall said. “I think that they just want to know how long, because if it’s only for a pay period, that’s not enough to bring them back. It has to be an extended pay for them to come back or want to stay there.”

He advised travelers with upcoming flights to anticipate longer security lines for at least another week or two. “This back and forth about all these decisions changing is confusing the TSA officers, so they’re possibly thinking like, ‘OK are we getting paid or are we not?'”

According to the White House, funding to pay TSA employees will come from a tax cut bill signed into law last year, which provided billions in additional funds to Homeland Security. This money has kept Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers paid during the DHS shutdown.

Johnny Jones, secretary-treasurer of the TSA worker division of the American Federation of Government Employees union, acknowledged the president’s action but stressed the need for Congress to resolve the DHS shutdown. “I guess the action is good for the president, but on the flip side, we have a lot of people that don’t have anything, and I don’t know if this is gonna fix it.”

Airports facing severe staffing shortages must now decide whether to reopen checkpoints or expedited service lanes that were closed or consolidated. Some airports experienced daily TSA officer callout rates reaching 40%, while nationwide on Thursday, more than 11.8% of scheduled TSA employees missed work—the highest rate recorded during the shutdown.

The staffing situation faces additional challenges as nearly 500 of the agency’s approximately 50,000 officers have quit since the shutdown began, according to the Department of Homeland Security. TSA Acting Administrator Ha Nguyen McNeill informed lawmakers that recruitment will likely become more difficult after the shutdown’s disruptions.

“Not only is the shutdown decreasing the number of interested candidates, for those we are able to hire, they are required to complete four to six months of training before they are certified to work at checkpoints,” McNeill explained.

Aviation security expert Sheldon Jacobson, whose research contributed to TSA PreCheck’s development, offered a more measured perspective, noting that the extreme wait times in some cities were outliers rather than the norm. “At a lot of the airports I look at, the delays are pretty typical,” he said.

Jacobson also pointed out that the number of TSA officers who have quit since mid-February isn’t significantly higher than the position’s normal attrition rate of around 8%.