Socialist antitrust activists killed Spirit Airlines — and learned nothing

It is a bad time to fly. Willie Walsh, head of the International Air Transport Association, drove home the point this week when he warned that “war-related disruptions in the Middle East and rising fuel costs have shifted the outlook for airlines to the worse.”

Walsh pointed to the recent closure of Spirit Airlines, America’s most iconic budget carrier, and warned that more airlines could suffer the same fate if current trends continue. That means fewer choices for fliers and higher prices at the airport.

Before Democrats demand that courts second-guess another antitrust settlement, they should reckon with the consequences of the last one they cheered.

But blaming the state of air travel solely on the Iran war is far too convenient. Airlines are also struggling because overzealous regulators and left-wing antitrust activists decided they knew better than the market.

Three years ago, Spirit had a plan to survive. It struck a merger agreement with JetBlue, another economy carrier, to create a new, globally scaled affordable airline. The Justice Department joined six states and the District of Columbia to file an antitrust lawsuit blocking the deal.

In early 2024, a federal judge sided with the Biden administration and blocked the merger. Biden officials and congressional Democrats cheered. Without JetBlue’s capital, Spirit’s struggles mounted. The airline filed for bankruptcy and earlier this year shut its doors.

Now many of the same officials who applauded the court order that killed Spirit are trying to shift blame to President Trump. The American people should not buy it, especially given what those same Biden officials said at the time.

Then-Attorney General Merrick Garland called the judge’s ruling “a victory for tens of millions of travelers who would have faced higher fares and fewer choices had the proposed merger between JetBlue and Spirit been allowed to move forward.”

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) took to X to declare, “I’ve warned for months that a @JetBlue-@SpiritAirlines merger would have led to fewer flights and higher fares. @JusticeATR and @USDOT were right to stand up for consumers and fight against runaway airline consolidation. This is a Biden win for flyers!”

Pete Buttigieg, Biden’s transportation secretary, openly bragged about siding with the Justice Department and helping prevent the merger in the name of protecting “low fares” and “competition.”

The reality looks very different now.

Spirit’s shutdown was the first complete closure of a major U.S. carrier in 25 years. It was caused directly by the same actions the Biden administration once boasted about.

Travelers lost a low-cost option. Spirit’s more than 11,000 employees saw their lives upended. And Spirit’s disappearance will deepen the coming travel recession. The airline placed downward pressure on fares for years. Without it, prices are rising.

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Travelers now face fewer choices at the airport. The remaining choices tend to be pricier, more consolidated carriers that no doubt welcomed Spirit’s demise.

One might hope antitrust enforcers would learn the obvious lesson: Bigger does not always mean worse. Sometimes mergers preserve competition. Sometimes they lower out-of-pocket costs for consumers. Sometimes blocking a merger kills the very competitor regulators claim to protect.

Unfortunately, many Democrats refuse to accept that reality.

Some of the same members of Congress and state attorneys general who supported blocking the Spirit-JetBlue merger now want courts to use the Tunney Act to second-guess other Trump administration antitrust decisions. The Tunney Act gives courts a limited role in reviewing antitrust settlements negotiated by the Justice Department. Democrats now want judges to stretch that role and challenge straightforward Trump settlements, including one merger backed by the intelligence community on national security grounds.

Historically, courts have deferred to the executive branch’s enforcement decisions. Democrats now want judges to intervene because they do not like the Trump administration’s policy choices.

Perhaps they should look in the mirror first.

Competition policy should protect consumers. It should not exist to punish private commerce, indulge ideological hostility to business, or let socialist antitrust activists pretend they can manage markets better than the people actually operating in them.

Spirit Airlines offers a painful lesson. The Biden administration, Elizabeth Warren, and other antitrust crusaders celebrated the decision that prevented Spirit from joining forces with JetBlue. Today, Spirit is gone, more than 11,000 workers have paid the price, and travelers have fewer choices at the airport.

Before Democrats demand that courts second-guess another antitrust settlement, they should reckon with the consequences of the last one they cheered.