Sky Harbor, Gateway airports will not show Kristi Noem's video on government shutdown
Phoenix airports won't show Kristi Noem video
Officials with both Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport and Mesa Gateway Airport have said they will not be showing a video featuring Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. In the video, Noem blames the Democrats for the ongoing federal shutdown.
PHOENIX - Officials with both Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport and Mesa Gateway Airport are weighing in on a video featuring Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem that talks about the impact of the ongoing federal government shutdown.
What they're saying:
In separate statements released on Oct. 14, officials with both Phoenix area airports said they will not be showing the video.
Officials with Sky Harbor say their decision is consistent with airport policy.
"The policy does not permit political content," read a portion of the brief statement.
Meanwhile, officials with Gateway say they have a "board approved advertising policy that prohibits political content."
According to reports from Tucson television station KOLD-TV, the southern Arizona city's airport will also not be showing the video, albeit for a different reason: the airport does not have video screens in TSA area, where the video was to be played. Airport officials went on to say even if there were screens, they have policies that ban political speech on advertising screens.
What we know:
According to the Associated Press, Noem blames Democrats for the federal government shutdown and its impact on Transportation Security Administration (TSA) operations. In the video, Noem said that TSA's ‘top priority’ is to help make travel pleasant and efficient while keeping passengers safe.
"However, Democrats in Congress refuse to fund the federal government, and because of this, many of our operations are impacted, and most of our TSA employees are working without pay," Noem went on to say.
The video featuring Noem is not the only material that blames the Democrats for the ongoing shutdown: on Oct. 2, the AP reported that several government websites have blamed the Democrats for the shutdown, even before the shutdown began. Out-of-office messages by some federal employees were also replaced with language that blamed Democrats.
Other airports are also not showing the video
Sky Harbor and Gateway are not the only airports in the U.S. to have made such a decision on Noem's video.
Big picture view:
Per the AP, airports in Atlanta, Charlotte, Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, Seattle and more say the video goes against their airport policy, or other regulations that prohibit political messaging in their facilities.
In Seattle, our sister station KCPQ-TV reported that officials with the airport at Portland, Ore. have also decided against playing the video, citing concerns over the potential of violating the Hatch Act and Oregon state law.
What is the Hatch Act?
Dig deeper:
Per the U.S. Office of Special Counsel's website, the Hatch Act was passed in 1939, and it "limits certain political activities of federal employees, as well as some state, D.C., and local government employees who work in connection with federally funded programs."
"The law’s purposes are to ensure that federal programs are administered in a nonpartisan fashion, to protect federal employees from political coercion in the workplace, and to ensure that federal employees are advanced based on merit and not based on political affiliation," the website reads.
According to a Sept. 2014 list of what is allowed and not allowed under the Hatch Act for federal workers, an employee covered by the Hatch Act may not, among other things, engage in political activity, which was defined in the document as "activity directed at the success or failure of a political party, candidate for partisan political office, or partisan political group — while the employee is on duty, in any federal room or building, while wearing a uniform or official insignia, or using any federally owned or leased vehicle."
"The Hatch Act generally applies to employees working in the executive branch of the federal government," read a portion of the document.
Per an Oct. 10, 2025 article by The Hill, an environmental advocacy group has filed Hatch Act complaints against the Department of Health and Human Services and the Forest Service over messages that they describe as "partisan."