Funding was shut off to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) over demands for reforms at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), as well as Customs and Border Protection, following alleged abuses and the fatal shooting of 2 United States citizens by federal agents in Minneapolis earlier in the year. The TSA is under the DHS, and has around 65,000 employees, 50,000 of which are front-line officers who are responsible for security at the nation’s airports.

Over the course of the past week, there has been a national callout rate of 10% at TSA. With the highest coming on Friday, at 10.22%. JFK Airport in New York City had a callout rate of 29.5% on Friday, with Houston International and Houston Hobby Airport having callout rates of 36.6% and 51.5% on the same day. And as a result of these callout rates, there have been an increase in wait times.

Travel at major United States airports turned into a nightmare on Sunday, with up to 3 hour security wait times, with airports warning passengers of these wait times, recommending that passengers arrive up to 5 hours before their flights. William P. Hobby Airport in Houston experienced wait times of 2 hours 45 minutes, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport had wait times of an hour, while George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston had wait times of 51 minutes.

President Trump said that ICE agents will be sent to airports to aid understaffed TSA employees starting March 23. “On Monday, ICE will be going to airports to help our wonderful TSA Agents who have stayed on the job despite the fact that the Radical Left Democrats, who are only focused on protecting hard line criminals who have entered our Country illegally, are endangering the USA by holding back the money that was long ago agreed to with signed and sealed contracts, and all,” Trump wrote in a social media post on March 22.