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Posted on 04/23/2026 3:27:29 PM PDT by Miami Rebel
The Trump administration is in advanced discussions with budget carrier Spirit Airlines about a bailout, sources familiar with the negotiations told CBS News.
The financing package could include a loan of up to $500 million, in exchange for warrants that would allow the federal government to take a potentially substantial ownership stake in the beleaguered airline, the sources said.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is one of the chief proponents pushing the Trump administration to take an ownership stake in the carrier, multiple sources told CBS News.
The deal is not done and is subject to change, but could be finalized imminently, the sources said. The negotiations were first reported by The Wall Street Journal.
The talks come after Mr. Trump weighed in publicly Tuesday, suggesting that while he preferred another airline acquire Spirit, he wanted his administration to look at a rescue package.
A spokesperson for Spirit Airlines declined to comment, and said that the carrier was operating as normal.
The Department of Transportation also declined to comment. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said Tuesday that, while no decision had been made, "the clock is ticking." While the federal government has stepped in to help the airline industry broadly in the aftermath of 9/11 and during the COVID-19 pandemic, propping up a single carrier is an unusual move.
"A lot of people work for Spirit. We care about the people that work for Spirit in this industry," Duffy told CBS News. "The question will be, can we do anything to save Spirit and make it viable, or would we be putting good money into a company that inevitably is gonna be liquidated? And that's a decision that our teams look at and the president has to be briefed on and, and we'll make a decision together."
Spirit Airlines is based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and employs about 15,000 people. About 6,000 of those employees are based in Florida.
Prices generally rise when an ultra low cost carrier exits the market. Spirit ended its last two routes at the Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport in December 2025. Both routes — St. Paul to Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport and St. Paul to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport — involved Delta hubs. Within days, Delta raised fares, in some cases by as much as 50%.
When fellow ultra low cost carrier Frontier Airlines departed a market, average fares on that route increased, according to data from aviation analytics company Cirium.
In 149 markets where Frontier stopped flying between 2023 and 2025, average fares increased 15.5%, or about $18, per ticket. Prices rose only about 2.5%, or about 93 cents, in markets where Frontier continued to fly. Nearly 79% of those 149 routes saw average fares increase the following year. In the 91 routes that Frontier exited between 2024 and 2025, 85% saw fares rise, by an average of $26 per ticket.
In some markets, the prices were more pronounced: Flights between Fort Meyers, Florida, and San Juan, Puerto Rico, jumped $127 in the year after Frontier left, while trips between Cincinnati and Philadelphia increased by $83.
"Budget airlines are like weights when it comes to airfares," said Atmosphere Research Group airline analyst Henry Harteveldt. "They help keep fares down on the airlines that compete with them. When there are no budget airlines on a route, airfares take off faster than the planes themselves."
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If the government invests in Spirit, it would mark the SIXTEENTH time we taxpayers have become investors in private companies. Intel at $8.9 billion and Korea Zinc at $2.2 billion are the biggest.
Let them fail. Was wrong with GM, is wrong with Spirit now
You mean you’re AGAINST centrally-planned state capitalism??
That means you’re a RINO or aa socialist or a libtard.
[Please don’t make me add the “/sc” disclaimer.]
Actually, I think Trump is trying to PROTECT Southwest, if you know what I mean.
das raciss (/s)
To be Sirius, there really is no way to run a low-price airline anywhere other than into the ground. You either stop being low-price (cf. Southwest) or run out of cash, jet fuel, or both.
This is very bad policy. If a company cannot make it, let it fail. If there’s a void, someone will fill it. That’s how markets work.
Furthermore, the government owning private companies is socialism.
I remember when the country allowed businesses to fail.
Spirit Airlines doesn’t really impress me as “too big to fail.” They are a crap airline. And there are certainly a dozen others who could pick up their load.
I'd rather not fly with Spirit's customers.
The beginning of this is where the Trump administration is correct - the Biden DOJ should not have blocked the merger of Jet Blue and Spirit airlines.
The stupid Biden DOJ argued that there would be diminished competition if Jet Blue and Spirit merged. They failed to understand the industry. Jet Blue and Spirit were not just competitors with each other, which they were, they both also competed heavily against the major airlines. Biden’s DOJ did not ask the question of what happens to “competition” if Spirit - the weaker of the two - goes out of business. Now the Biden DOJ has accomplished what it claimed it was trying to prevent - one “low cost” airline.
Combined, the two - Jet Blue and Spirit, would have been stronger and still in competition with the major airlines. And we would have not seen Spirit now looking for a handout.
That is what the Trump administration understands.
Biden screwed up and now they want to see if they can fix it.
you guys are not looking at the big picture.
look at intc, when President Trump bailed them out, they were at 20$ and i immediately invested 10k, have you check the stock today? i had the foresight to invest in government pc, now it’s time for our national airline.
the stock is dirt cheap right now, imagine what’s going to happen next year this time with Trump still on the helm?
it’s just money not politics
Spirit has been on my s-list/no-fly-list for a number of years.
But then I hate the TSA too.
[Why fly when you can drive and control the outcome?]
Giving a gummint bailout to Spirit is no less than picking the pockets of the profitable airlines. You can’t beat a company that’s playing with House money.
This is PURE BS.
How are all the riff raff going to fly down to get on their Carnival Cruises?
“They are a crap airline.”
Yeah. Not a fan although they may serve a niche. I dont want them to fail. But its too late for that. I support bailouts in certain cases but not this one.
I see what you did there.
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