• The acting head of the TSA said more than 480 officers working without pay have quit during the shutdown.
• She said they can't be replaced fast enough to adequately staff airports for the World Cup in June.
• It could be another saga of long security lines due to understaffed TSA during a peak travel period.

Even if the partial government shutdown ends soon, the fallout at the Transportation Security Administration could spill into the summer's marquee event.

In a House testimony on Wednesday, acting TSA administrator Ha Nguyen McNeill said that so many officers have quit since their pay stopped in mid-February that the agency can't get replacements fast enough to adequately staff airports ahead of the World Cup in June.

She said TSA officers spend four to six months in training before working checkpoints, but the games — which will take place across 16 cities in the US, Canada, and Mexico — start in just 80 days.

"This is a dire situation," she said, adding that more than 480 officers have quit so far. "We are facing a potential perfect storm of severe staffing shortages and an influx of millions of passengers at our airports."

TSA agents haven't been paid for nearly six weeks, yet are deemed "essential" and expected to work during the shutdown, with back pay promised afterward. Their annual pay starts at around $40,000 and averages $60,000 to $75,000 a year with experience.

Still, many live paycheck to paycheck and can't afford to work unpaid for months at a time — quitting and finding another job or doing gig work is often their best option.

Mass TSA agent quits and callouts amid the shutdown, compounded by peak spring break travel, have already created hourslong security lines and stranded travelers. It's a preview of the chaos that could repeat when an estimated 6 million fans descend on potentially understaffed airports for the World Cup.

"If we see any spikes [in attrition], we're going to have to pivot and assess how we are going to staff the FIFA locations adequately," McNeill said.

Passengers traveling to the scheduled World Cup games in San Francisco and Kansas City, however, are likely safe from staffing chaos.

Both city airports use private security officers employed by contract companies instead of TSA, meaning their agents are being paid despite the shutdown.

It's not just the TSA sounding the alarm

Former Republican Sen. from Oklahoma, Markwayne Mullin — who was confirmed as the new head of the Department of Homeland Security on Monday after Kristi Noem's ousting in early March — said in a Senate hearing last week that the US is "behind" on World Cup preparations and the shutdown is making it worse.

"It'll take four months once funding comes in to start replacing those that we've lost for training before we can get them out in the field; we don't have four months with FIFA," he said. "How do we expect these people to stay on the job and work? We're losing institutional knowledge, we're losing people we've already trained."

The mass quits are exacerbating a problem that was already flagged last year.

A February 2025 report from the US Travel Association — long before the shutdown's impact could be factored in — warned that the TSA may not be efficient enough to handle surging travel volumes during the World Cup.

On its busiest days, the agency screened about 3 million passengers. During the games, the organization said that level of traffic would be the norm.

Lawmakers are still negotiating a funding deal to reopen DHS and end the partial shutdown.

• TSA workers are unpaid and face another missed check on March 27 during the partial shutdown.
• Congress has to allocate funding for TSA workers to get paid, but is scheduled to recess after March 27.
• In the meantime, travelers have been stuck in chaos as TSA workers call out or quit.

As lines snake across airports and Transportation Security Administration workers clock in for another day without pay, a major turning point in the ongoing chaos looms on March 27.

Come Friday, around 47,000 TSA workers are set to miss yet another paycheck, according to their union, the American Federation of Government Employees. That's due to the ongoing partial government shutdown, which has left most of the Department of Homeland Security unfunded. TSA workers haven't received full paychecks since February 14. As a result, hundreds of TSA workers have quit, and thousands have called out of work, contributing to ongoing travel snarls for Americans trying to fly.

Friday might mark more than another empty paycheck: March 27 is the final date Congress is scheduled to be in session before a two-week recess, and lawmakers need to come to a DHS funding deal for TSA workers to get paid.

Lawmakers have clashed over funding DHS after the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renée Good, with Democrats calling for reforms to ICE and Customers and Border Protection. Ultimately, the rest of the government was funded while leaving DHS in the lurch, even as ICE agents are still paid through separate funding from President Donald Trump's sweeping tax and spending bill last year.

There is some potential for relief. Some lawmakers have signaled that they're ready to move forward on a deal, according to CBS News. If that does move forward, the agency could be funded ahead of the break, and workers would start collecting paychecks again.

"President Trump is using every tool available to help American travelers who are facing hours long lines at airports across the country—especially during this spring break and holiday season that is very important for many American families," Acting Assistant DHS Secretary Lauren Bis said in a statement to Business Insider. "This pointless, reckless shutdown of our homeland security workforce has caused more than 458 TSA officers to quit and thousands to call out from work because they are not able to afford gas, childcare, food, or rent."

The TSA woes are being felt at airports across the country. Some travelers have spent hours waiting in lines and faced harrowing conditions as they attempted to navigate through security. Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport are both warning passengers to expect wait times of 4 or more hours. To try to mitigate the situation, the Trump administration has sent in ICE agents, a move that AFGE slammed over agents lacking aviation security training.

Mike Gayzagian, president of AFGE Local 2617, which represents TSA workers in airports across New England, said Friday could mark a "hard choice" for TSA workers. If they go without pay, but know there's a deal in place for funding, there might not be a major staffing issue, he said. He thinks that, for some workers, the "damage has already been done."

"It's a good-paying job, and good-paying jobs are hard to find, and reliable, good-paying jobs are even harder to find. The federal government was the gold standard for good-paying, reliable jobs," Gayzagian said. "After this, that's no longer the case. I think a lot of discussion will surround that fact later on, after this is over."

• San José airport starts testing an AI robot called José to assist travelers.
• The pilot test launched on Tuesday amid travel chaos at many US airports.
• Some TSA workers have stopped coming into work due to a government shutdown.

One of Silicon Valley's main airports just made its newest hire, a robot named "José."

San José Mineta International Airport is turning to artificial intelligence to ease the strain of modern air travel, debuting "José," a humanoid robot, as some US airports grapple with staffing shortages and widespread delays.

Developed by Silicon Valley startup IntBot, José is designed to greet passengers, answer questions, and provide real-time updates while autonomously navigating busy terminals.

The robot will be stationed in SJC's Terminal B as part of a four-month pilot, "singlehandedly running his own gate," according to an email previewing the test that referred to José as the airport's "newest hire."

Airport officials said the launch highlights San José's role as a testing ground for emerging technologies to improve customer service.

"By piloting IntBot, we're exploring how artificial intelligence can enhance the passenger journey while reinforcing SJC's role as the gateway to Silicon Valley," said SJC Director of Aviation Mookie Patel.

The timing is notable. Airports across the US have been hit by long security lines and travel chaos, driven in part by many Transportation Security Administration workers not reporting to work during a partial government shutdown. With TSA agents going unpaid at the height of the spring break season, some airports have struggled to maintain normal operations.

José the robot represents a broader push to automate parts of the airport experience, from passenger assistance to information delivery.

SJC officials said the pilot will help evaluate how multimodal AI, combining vision, audio, and language, performs in real-world environments.

The future of air travel may include a robotic helping hand — and it can't come fast enough for weary vacationers stuck in long lines.

Sign up for BI's Tech Memo newsletter here. Reach out to me via email at abarr@businessinsider.com.

• TSA agents at US airports are working without pay amid a partial government shutdown.
• Their salaries start around $40,000 annually and increase with time and experience.
• Top-level TSA leaders and workers living in expensive cities can earn six figures.

For five weeks, the people screening passengers and bags at US airports have been working without pay as the government shutdown — the second in four months — stretches on.

It's hitting a workforce that often lives paycheck to paycheck on middle-class salaries and is turning to food banks and community donations to get by.

More than 300 Transportation Security Administration officers (TSOs) have left the agency since mid-February, compounding staffing shortages that have created hourslong lines at airports like Orlando, Houston Hobby, and Philadelphia.

"We know these are not highly paid jobs, and we know that from the last government shutdown that it's difficult for TSA agents to work on a sustained basis without getting any income," Henry Harteveldt, a travel analyst and the president of Atmosphere Research Group, told Business Insider. "The need to find supplementary jobs that will provide some type of income is completely understandable."

These screening officers receive modest pay but collectively have ensured that the US air travel system remains one of the world's safest and busiest in the quarter century since the 9/11 plane hijackings.

Most of the roughly 50,000 agents who interact with passengers daily start around $40,000 annually. They average "anywhere from $60,000 to $75,000" as they gain experience, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson told Business Insider.

TSOs living in more expensive cities, including Chicago, Houston, and San Francisco, receive a locality-based pay boost that can put them into at least the high five figures before any bonus opportunities.

Beyond frontline officers, senior officials — like regional directors who oversee multiple airports and managers at TSA headquarters who typically don't screen bags — can make six figures.

However, all of that pay is now on hold until Congress reaches a deal to fund DHS, whose funding lapsed on February 14 amid an impasse over the Trump Administration's immigration crackdown. TSOs received their first $0 paycheck in mid-March.

How TSO pay works

According to TSA Careers — a non-government website that the agency directed Business Insider to for information — TSO pay is organized into pay bands D through L, roughly corresponding to the federal government's GS-5 to GS-15 scale for civil servants.

Each band is divided into 10 "steps" that reflect time in service and incremental pay increases, with employees able to reach Step 10 within their given grade in about 3 years. TSOs are promoted to higher pay bands based on seniority and performance and can earn more by working overtime, nights, and Sundays.

At the bottom, brand-new TSOs, classified as Band D (roughly GS-5 equivalent) at Step 1, earn about $35,000 a year before locality or bonus pay, per the table. Most US cities receive an additional 16.8% locality adjustment in 2026, putting the lowest earners at an annual salary of around $40,000.

That works out to roughly $19 per hour for a standard 40-hour workweek — two and a half times the federal minimum wage of $7.25 and greater than any state minimum wage.

According to the global statistics website World Population Review, $40,000 still falls below the cost of living for a single adult with no children in most states; median wages for full-time workers in the US are about $63,000 a year, per Bureau of Labor Statistics data.

Climbing the pay ladder — and living in more expensive cities — leads to higher wages for security screeners. At the top of the D band, for example, a Step 10 TSO in an airport with standard locality pay would earn about $52,300 annually, or about $25 per hour.

The table below shows the full range of what TSOs make across pay bands and steps before locality adjustments.

TSOs in about 50 higher-cost-of-living cities receive additional locality pay, with the largest being in San Francisco, where agents earn 46.3% on top of their base salary.

That would put a Band D Step 1 TSO new hire at about $50,500 a year in the Bay Area, after locality pay but before any extra income. Their Band D base salary caps out at about $65,600; Band E caps out at about $81,000.

A handful of other locations — including Seattle, Boston, Houston, Chicago, New York City, Los Angeles, San Diego, Hartford, Connecticut, Washington, DC, and Alaska — receive locality boosts of at least 30%.

For example, TSOs at the top of the E band in DC, with a 33.9% locality, make about $74,000 annually. New York TSOs with a 38% locality in the same band earn between roughly $59,000 and $76,500.

TSOs earn more by climbing the leadership ladder

Experienced TSOs with years on the job and strong performance can advance into higher pay bands associated with management, analytical, and supervisory positions.

For example, moving into the F band — which includes roles like Lead TSO or Security Training Instructor — would place that agent in a salary range of roughly $61,000 to $79,000.

Program analysts, who work behind the scenes to optimize TSA efficiency through strategic planning and coordination, can fall into the G band. In a standard locality, they make between roughly $74,000 and $96,000. Cities like Houston or Hartford would push into the six figures.

The highest earners include top TSA leadership, like Federal Security Directors (FSDs), who oversee operations at their assigned airports and can earn about $162,600 in base pay at the top of the K and L bands.

Locality pay puts this even higher. A Step 1 FSD in San Francisco would make about $183,000 a year, rising to roughly $238,000 at Step 10, per the table. In Los Angeles, the base salary would range from about $170,000 to $222,000.

• Delays persist at TSA checkpoints across US airports due to the partial government shutdown.
• As of Monday morning, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Airport is advising travelers to show up 4 hours early.
• Here's the latest on TSA delays, and how to check wait times before you travel.

If you're flying in the US, get ready to stand in line.

Airports across the US are continuing to see lengthy waits at security checkpoints as scores of TSA workers call out due to missed paychecks.

A partial government shutdown has left the Department of Homeland Security and its Transportation Security Administration unfunded and their agents unpaid at the height of the spring break travel season.

As many as 10% of all TSA agents called out on several days last week, DHS updates showed, with absence rates averaging as much as 20% in some airports. A DHS spokesperson told Business Insider that some airports, such as William P. Hobby Airport in Houston, had seen absence rates as high at 40.8%.

Security lines in affected airports are spiking unpredictably from day to day, and sometimes even from hour to hour.

"The current unpredictability is being driven by unpredictable staffing levels, basically, how many TSA officers are showing up for work on any given day," Sheldon H. Jacobson, the founder professor of engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and an expert on aviation security and airport security screening, told Business Insider.

"TSA officers have historically been cross-trained to do many different tasks, so the number that show up is the key factor," Jacobson said.

How long are the TSA delays?

Delays at TSA checkpoints across the US have been unpredictable, and some airports are changing how they're communicating with travelers.

As of Monday morning, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the world's busiest by passenger numbers, now displays the following message on its website: "Due to current federal conditions, passengers are advised to allow at least 4 hours or more for domestic and international screenings."

Atlanta has been among the worst-affected airports since the shutdown began, with over a third of TSA staff not showing up on some days.

The airport said there had been congestion at the international checkpoint as domestic travelers try to bypass long lines in the domestic terminal. The airport said domestic travelers should use the domestic checkpoints.

At Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport, lines stretched over three hours on Sunday evening. As of Monday morning, the average wait time is 28 minutes.

Lines at checkpoints at JFK, the New York area's biggest airport, are running at 45 minutes on Monday.

JFK said it has "deployed additional customer care staff into terminals to help manage queues, assist passengers, and keep people moving as efficiently as possible."

As of Monday, Newark Liberty International Airport displays a message on its website that says security wait times may be "significantly longer than normal."

"Please allow for significantly more time and check with your airline for the current status of your flight," the message says.

Separate from TSA issues, LaGuardia Airport was closed early Monday after a plane collided with a vehicle. It will remain closed until at least 2 p.m. ET.

Denver, home of the fourth-busiest airport in the US, is experiencing wait times of 45 minutes on Monday. Dallas-Fort Worth lines are at 46 minutes.

At Los Angeles International Airport, the nation's fifth-busiest travel hub, waits were listed as "0" minutes.

Some airports have so far avoided the hourslong lines. Business Insider's Taylor Rains flew out of Las Vegas last week and saw minimal TSA lines.

The maximum wait time at Philadelphia International Airport was listed as 30 minutes on Monday, although some terminals were quicker.

How to check TSA wait times

The unpredictable delays mean travelers should plan for long waits even if their airport hasn't yet experienced problems.

The easiest way to avoid the stress of missing your flight is to give yourself extra time in the airport. Many airports are advising travelers this week to arrive up to three hours before their flight, even for domestic flights.

Many airports, including major hubs like Atlanta, Houston, JFK, Newark, Philadelphia, Dallas-Fort Worth, and Denver, have been posting TSA wait times live on their websites.

These can also provide more specific insights. For example, DFW's website shows the wait times at each checkpoint.

You can also use the MyTSA mobile app. It provides estimated wait times in 15-minute intervals based on average checkpoint data. The app, however, will use historical data if the live data cannot be retrieved. The TSA also says it is not "actively" managing its sites during the partial shutdown, and so the app may not always be updated.

How long will the TSA delays persist?

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said airport delays could get worse.

"As we get into next week and they're about to miss another payment, this is going to look like child's play, what's happening right now," Duffy said on CNBC.

Some airports could be forced to close, both Duffy and Adam Stahl, the TSA's acting deputy administrator, said.

Airports like Denver and Seattle have asked the public for food, gift cards, and basic supplies to support TSA staff working without pay.

• TSA agents have gone unpaid for the last month, causing delays at some airports.
• That's because of the ongoing DHS shutdown, spurred by disagreements over ICE funding.
• Here's where things stand with the ongoing partial government shutdown.

If you've been to the airport in the US lately, you may have encountered long lines at security.

That's because Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents have been working without pay since mid-February.

Some of those agents, fed up with the situation, have begun calling in sick or even quitting, according to the agency.

So, why aren't agents getting paid?

A long but largely ignored partial government shutdown

You may not have realized it, but the US has been in a partial government shutdown since February 14. It's already the third-longest shutdown in American history.

A "shutdown" occurs when lawmakers in Washington fail to pass a bill to fund a portion of the government. The longest-ever shutdown occurred in the fall and lasted 43 days.

But this one's different because every department has been funded for the rest of the fiscal year, except one: the Department of Homeland Security.

That department oversees several agencies, including not just TSA, but also the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Coast Guard, and — most significantly — Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP).

It all goes back to Minneapolis

Just a couple of months ago, none of this seemed like it would happen. Then, Alex Pretti was shot by border patrol officers in Minneapolis on January 24.

Pretti's death, along with the fatal shooting of Renée Good two weeks earlier, led to outrage among Democrats on Capitol Hill, who demanded reforms to both CBP and ICE before they would agree to fund the agencies any further.

While Republicans have a majority in both chambers, the Senate's 60-vote "filibuster" rule means that Democratic votes are needed to pass major funding legislation, given that there are just 53 GOP senators.

The Pretti shooting happened just before a package of government funding bills, including the bill to fund DHS, was set to come up for a vote.

Lawmakers in both parties ultimately agreed to strip DHS funding from the package and pass the rest, and there was only a brief shutdown at the end of January, largely due to timing.

That kicked off negotiations between Democrats and Republicans over DHS funding, which have largely stalled in recent weeks.

Where things stand right now

Democrats have laid out a series of demands for ICE and CBP, including ending roving patrols and tightening arrest warrant rules, increasing accountability measures for ICE, including independent investigations, and adding body cameras and removing masks from ICE officers.

Republicans have publicly rejected many of those points, and while the two sides have exchanged proposals, negotiations have largely stalled.

In the meantime, Democrats in both the House and the Senate have begun to press for bills that would fund DHS except for ICE and CBP.

In a letter to colleagues sent on Monday, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries announced that Democrats would try to force a vote on a bill to do just that in the coming weeks.

Meanwhile, Senate Democrats have tried to pass similar legislation, but have also been blocked.

Republicans have largely objected to these efforts out of concern that, should those bills pass, Democrats will have little incentive to continue negotiating on ICE and CBP, potentially leaving those agencies without funding in the long term.

• Airport security checkpoints in the US are under pressure due to the partial government shutdown.
• Many now-unpaid TSA agents are skipping work or even quitting, causing long lines and wait times.
• Here's the latest on TSA delays, and how to check wait times before you travel.

If there's anything that can bring Americans together to demand government action, it's long lines at airport security.

Those lines persisted at airports across the US this week as a partial government shutdown left the Department of Homeland Security and its Transportation Security Administration unfunded and their agents unpaid at the height of the spring break travel season.

Airports are now telling passengers to arrive up to three hours early to clear security in time for their flights.

The TSA on Sunday called on Congress to resolve the impasse over the immigration enforcement policies that have left the DHS unfunded for a month. The agency said hundreds of unpaid agents have quit.

"3+ hour TSA lines for travelers. 300+ TSA officers who have quit. A $0 paycheck for those continuing to serve. Enough is enough," the agency said in an X post on Saturday.

A group of airline CEOs also sent a letter to Congress on Saturday calling on Republicans and Democrats to figure it out. "Americans —who live in your districts and home states — are tired of long lines at airports, travel delays, and flight cancellations caused by shutdown after shutdown," the letter, which was signed by the CEOs of Delta, United, American, JetBlue, and others, says.

By early Tuesday morning, lengthy lines were still present at several airports, though they had calmed at some locations that had seen long lines over the weekend.

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the world's busiest by passenger numbers, had lines as long as 90 minutes at some domestic security checkpoints early on Tuesday morning, having seen waits of up to 2 hours over the weekend.

In a Monday X post, the airport encouraged travelers to allow extra time for screening and to arrive at least 3 hours before their flight. Many flights also faced lengthy delays or cancellations due to a major storm.

Lines at some checkpoints in the New York area's two biggest airports, JFK and Newark, were both around 30 minutes long early Tuesday.

At Dallas-Fort Worth, waits varied by checkpoint, ranging from over 20 minutes to as short as 2 minutes.

Austin-Bergstrom International was one of the worst-affected airports over the weekend, due in part to an influx of travelers for the SXSW festival.

The airport's social media channels are posting frequent updates about how busy TSA lines are, showing long lines in the terminal building on Tuesday morning.

While busy, Austin appeared to have calmed down compared to the end of last week and the weekend. Photos and videos shared by travelers over the weekend showed lines stretching from the terminal building into the parking lot.

To ensure passengers clear security in plenty of time, many airports are telling passengers to leave longer than usual to get through. Dallas-Fort Worth Airport told travelers to allow at least 2 hours for domestic flights, while Austin advised leaving 2.5 to 3 hours.

How to check wait times

The easiest way to avoid the stress of missing your flight is to arrive as early as you can. Many airports are advising travelers this week to arrive up to three hours before their flight.

To check TSA wait times, many airports, including major hubs like Atlanta, Houston, JFK, Newark, Philadelphia, Dallas-Fort Worth, and Denver, post them live on their websites.

These can also provide more specific insights. For example, DFW's website shows the wait times at each checkpoint.

While broadly reliable, some airport websites aren't always accurate. On Monday, Atlanta Airport said the feature was "currently unavailable due to a technical issue," although it was later fixed.

You can also use the MyTSA mobile app. It provides estimated wait times in 15-minute intervals based on average checkpoint data. The app, however, will use historical data if the live data cannot be retrieved. The TSA also says it is not "actively" managing its sites during the partial shutdown, and so the app may not always be updated.