United Airlines is slashing flights as soaring fuel prices tied to the Iran war hit U.S. carriers, becoming the first major U.S. airline to announce a cut to capacity after weeks of industry warnings.
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United CEO Scott Kirby said in a staff memo released Friday that the airline will cut about 5% of capacity by trimming less profitable routes. He said the company is preparing for a prolonged period of elevated fuel prices, modeling oil at $175 per barrel and expecting it could remain above $100 through the end of 2027.
“The reality is, jet fuel prices have more than doubled in the last three weeks,” Kirby said in a statement. “If prices stayed at this level, it would mean an extra $11B in annual expense just for jet fuel. For perspective, in United’s best year ever, we made less than $5B.”
Kirby stressed the airline is not panicking and plans to manage the short-term pressure by cutting unprofitable flying while continuing its long-term growth strategy.
United said the cuts will total about 5 percentage points of its planned capacity, including roughly 3 points from off-peak flying such as midweek and overnight routes, about 1 point from reductions at Chicago O’Hare, and another 1 point tied to suspended service to Tel Aviv and Dubai. The airline expects to restore its full schedule in the fall.
Despite the pullback, Kirby said demand remains strong, noting that the airline has recorded its “10 biggest booked revenue weeks” in its history over the past 10 weeks.
He emphasized that United is not responding to the fuel shock with drastic measures seen in past downturns, such as furloughs or delaying aircraft orders. Instead, the airline plans to continue taking delivery of about 120 new planes this year, including 20 Boeing 787s, with another 130 aircraft due by April 2028, he said.
“To be clear, nothing changes about our longer-term plans for aircraft deliveries or total capacity for 2027 and beyond, but there’s no point in burning cash in the near term on flying that just can’t absorb these fuel costs,” he said.
The strategy, Kirby said, is to cut unprofitable flying in the near term while continuing to invest in long-term growth.
Other airlines, meanwhile, have so far stopped short of announcing major flight cuts, underscoring how United is among the first U.S. carriers to move from warnings to action as fuel costs surge.
Delta Air Lines has said it could trim capacity if fuel prices stay elevated, according to Reuters, while other major U.S. carriers have so far relied on fare hikes to offset rising costs.
International carriers have moved faster, with airlines including Qantas, Scandinavian Airlines and Thai Airways raising prices, and Air New Zealand canceling more than 1,000 flights, according to earlier reports.
President Donald Trump on Saturday said he would send ICE agents to airports around the U.S. on Monday amid an ongoing standoff between Senate Republicans and Democrats over funding for the Department of Homeland Security.
“If the Democrats do not allow for Just and Proper Security at our Airports, and elsewhere throughout our Country, ICE will do the job far better than ever done before!” he wrote in a post on Truth Social, adding later, “I look forward to moving ICE in on Monday, and have already told them to, ‘GET READY.'”
The move came hours after the president first threatened to move ICE agents to airports, writing in a post on Truth Social earlier Saturday, “If the Radical Left Democrats don’t immediately sign an agreement to let our Country, in particular, our Airports, be FREE and SAFE again, I will move our brilliant and patriotic ICE Agents to the Airports where they will do Security like no one has ever seen before.”
In the first post, Trump also said ICE agents’ work in airports would include “the immediate arrest of all Illegal Immigrants who have come into our Country.”
His comments come one day after Democrats in the Senate voted down Republicans’ efforts to pass a bill to fund DHS, which has been partially shut down since mid-February.
The shutdown has led Transportation Security Administration officers who conduct security checks at U.S. airports to go unpaid, leading to callouts en masse and lengthy security lines at airports across the country.
ICE, another agency under DHS, is not affected by the ongoing shutdown, as that agency received $75 billion in additional funds from the “big, beautiful bill,” the president’s major legislative package that was passed and signed into law last year.
In February, Democrats vowed to shut down DHS until Republicans agreed to new checks on ICE agents such as requiring them to wear identification and banning them from wearing face coverings.
The move came after two Americans — Renee Good and Alex Pretti — were killed by federal law enforcement in Minnesota in January during a major immigration crackdown in the state.
This week, bipartisan negotiators on Capitol Hill met with fresh energy to work to end the shutdown. Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, met with some Senate lawmakers earlier this week.
One lawmaker, Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., told reporters on Friday that Republicans offered Democrats a new proposal this week.
“We’ve offered body cams, more training, limiting arrests for sensitive areas like churches and hospitals and so forth, schools, it’s a long list,” Hoeven said. “I think the Democrats need to come back to us now and talk to us about what they’re willing to do.”
Attempts to advance a bill that would fully fund DHS failed multiple times this week. On Friday, Democrats blocked a procedural vote, 47-37, with 16 senators missing the vote.
In remarks on the floor during a rare Saturday session, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., blamed Democrats for long TSA lines, saying, “The situation at U.S. airports continues to worsen thanks to Democrats’ refusal to fund the Department of Homeland Security. Thousands of Homeland Security employees have been working without pay for more than a month. The problems of having an unfunded Homeland Security Department continue to multiply, and Democrats, well, they just seem to shrug.”
Later, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said on the Senate floor, “It is unacceptable for workers and travelers in entire airports to get taken hostage in political games, but that is what the Republicans are doing. It is unacceptable to say we will only pay TSA workers if it is attached to a bill that funds ICE with no reforms, but that’s what the Republicans have been doing. Democrats want to pay TSA workers ASAP with no strings attached.”
Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., a key negotiator for Democrats on making a deal to end the shutdown, accused Republicans on Saturday of tying TSA funding to ICE funding after Senate GOP lawmakers, in a 41-49 vote, blocked efforts to pass a stand-alone TSA funding bill.
“Today, Senate Republicans voted against paying TSA agents because they insist on tying TSA funding to their push to give even more money to ICE — without basic reforms. That is not how this should work — and it is just plain wrong that Republicans are preventing TSA agents from getting paid while airport lines grow longer across the country,” Murray said.
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