With President Donald Trump and the GOP prolonging the partial government shutdown, a Republican lawmaker had an uncomfortable run-in Tuesday when a fellow airplane passenger found him flying first class from Chicago to Washington, D.C., according to a video of the encounter shared with HuffPost.
“Congressman, do you think it’s appropriate to fly first class while 57 TSA agents aren’t being paid?” the person says to Rep. Rodney Davis (R-Ill.), in an apparent reference to the Transportation Security Administration’s 57,000 employees, who are being required to work without pay. […]
Davis remained silent, prompting the person to say, “Taking that as a yes.”
“Taxpayers paid for this flight? Fair enough,” he added.
Davis spokesperson Ashley Phelps told the site that the lawmaker has never used tax-payer money to purchase first-class tickets, and did not do so for Tuesday’s flight.
Phelps said Davis’s office bought a coach ticket and was upgraded to first class because of his frequent flyer status.
“There was no additional cost to taxpayers,” she said.
OK, fine. I’ve taken upgrades before (the first time was when I was 16 and was delighted to be treated to champagne at takeoff). And the frequent flyer upgrades are allowed by congressional ethics rules. But it’s not like this hasn’t been an issue for Davis in the past. From the 2014 campaign…
Eerily prescient right down to the shutdown.
Not to mention that an ad on endless loop supporting Davis last fall made a big issue out of his opponent’s membership in a local yacht club.
