Trump administration officials Sean Duffy and Markwayne Mullin appeared to contradict one another during an awkward White House press conference about the massive aviation crisis that triggered a historic, hours-long nationwide ground stop.
The Department of Transportation (DOT) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) held the joint briefing Friday night to explain the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) system failure, which brought flights across the country to a halt for roughly five hours.
The FAA attributed the stoppage to “extraordinary circumstances for safety reasons,” citing communication problems at regional air traffic control centers. The disruption led to thousands of canceled flights and hundreds of delays nationwide.
Reporters questioned the officials about whether the failure could have been caused by a cyberattack. DHS Secretary Mullin said the administration was “still looking” into the cybersecurity issue, but suggested the initial evidence pointed to new equipment overwhelming the older system.
“That new equipment, new technology, just wasn’t—it was overwhelming the older system,” Mullin said haltingly as he tried to explain the source of the communications failure.
As Mullin struggled to describe the problem, Transportation Secretary Duffy appeared confused and subtly nudged his colleague.
Duffy also shook his head when Mullin said the new technology had been “overwhelming the system.”
A clip of the tense exchange quickly spread online, prompting social media users to dissect the body language between the two cabinet officials.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, left, and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin addressed reporters during an awkward Friday night briefing
The FAA imposed a historic ground stop Friday afternoon. Passengers were left stranded and are shown trying to travel Saturday morning after the order was lifted
Duffy appeared to awkwardly nudge Mullin as the DHS secretary discussed the FAA’s aging hardware
“You can see the moment of impact of the wheels of the bus hitting as he’s thrown under it,” one person wrote.
“The only message they were unified on was a pitch for the money. The rest is shady,” another commenter said.
“When they don’t have their stories synced up,” a third wrote.
Duffy and Mullin initially presented a united front, praising the Trump administration for coordinating its response to the aviation emergency.
Duffy said the FAA detected “instability for our radar and communications” at 3:36 p.m. EST, leading officials to issue the nationwide ground stop while more than 3,500 aircraft were already in the air.
The transportation secretary then turned to the FAA’s outdated communications network, saying it had been “overloaded and went down,” before quickly revising his wording. “I shouldn’t say it went down—there were inconsistencies,” he said.
Duffy blamed the failure on a “patchwork” system and called on Congress to provide $50 billion to modernize the FAA’s air traffic control equipment.
While Duffy maintained that the incident stemmed from aging infrastructure, Mullin said there was “nothing completely certain” when asked whether a cyberattack might have been involved.
“It appears that this was mechanically driven; however, we are still looking,” Mullin said, before echoing Duffy’s call for additional congressional funding for the FAA.
Duffy appeared confused when Mullin began discussing the FAA’s systems
Duffy insisted the communications failure was linked to outdated equipment, while the DHS secretary said a cyberattack had not been ruled out
Duffy then interrupted and redirected the discussion toward the FAA’s “old legacy equipment.”
As the briefing ended, Mullin praised President Trump’s leadership and his decision to have the two secretaries address the crisis together.
DHS and the DOT regularly work together on transportation and national security matters. During the summer, the two agencies announced a partnership aimed at preventing undocumented migrants from obtaining driver’s licenses.
Although Mullin and Duffy supported that initiative, they had previously disagreed over immigration policy.
In May, Mullin openly threatened to withdraw Customs and Border Protection personnel from airports in sanctuary cities in an effort to discourage the policy.
Sanctuary cities are largely governed by Democrats and typically limit the extent to which local law enforcement agencies can cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The DOT opposed the proposal at the time. US Travel said in a statement: “US Travel believes such a move would have devastating consequences for the travel industry and communities that depend on international visitation.”
Duffy also rejected Mullin’s proposal during a congressional hearing. He said he was not familiar with the remarks but opposed restricting travel based on political affiliation, noting that Democrats would eventually return to power.
“We have people from around the world and around the country that need to be able to fly into all different kinds of places. We shouldn’t shut down air travel in a state that doesn’t agree with our politics,” he said.
Friday’s ground stop became a significant joint test for DHS and the DOT as both agencies continued investigating the communications failure.
The two administration officials faced questions from reporters after the historic FAA ground stop
Democrats seized on the disruption, calling for greater transparency from the Trump administration.
Senator Tammy Duckworth, the ranking Democrat on the Aviation, Space and Innovation Subcommittee, said in a statement that “the safety of our skies is built on redundancies.”
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries described the “unprecedented breakdown” as the latest in a series of unacceptable air travel incidents under what he called the Trump administration’s “failed leadership.”
Representative Robert Garcia called the nationwide ground stop “quite disturbing” during an interview on MS NOW.
Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg watched Duffy’s briefing from a hotel bar in Denver after attending a Democratic conference, while waiting for a flight, The New York Times reported.
Asked for his response to the press conference, Buttigieg told a reporter: “You can just write down the comic book asterisk swearing characters.” He added, “I have questions.”
The Democratic members of the House Committee on Homeland Security also criticized the administration’s response in a post on X.
“What the hell is going on?” the account wrote. “Trump and his cabinet are completely out of their depth.”
New Jersey Representative Nellie Pou, a Democrat on the House Subcommittee on Aviation, urged the Trump administration to “be prompt and forthright in providing answers.”
The ground stop lasted about five hours. More than 3,500 aircraft were in the air when the order was issued Friday
Americans experienced the longest aviation stoppage since 9/11 after an exceptionally rare ground stop stranded about 1.5 million passengers
The flight suspension was the first since January 11, 2023, when a malfunction in a key FAA computer system disrupted air travel. It was also only the second nationwide ground stop since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Duffy said Saturday morning that operations were “slowly returning to normal” and that aircraft were safe to fly, although delays were expected to continue.
As of 9 a.m. EST Saturday, there had been more than 10,500 total delays, including nearly 2,000 involving flights within, into or out of the United States, according to flight tracking data from FlightAware. Nearly 4,000 flights within, into or out of the US had been canceled Saturday.
The Daily Mail contacted DHS for comment. The DOT referred the newspaper to Duffy’s press conference when asked about his response to Mullin’s remarks.