Memorial Day Travel Surge to Test Airports,

While domestic air-travel numbers last Christmas were only half those in 2019, recent Transportation Security Administration counts have them now hovering around 90% of pre-pandemic levels. The TSA screened 1.9 million passengers last Sunday, a 14-month high.

Bookings from leisure travelers heading to the beaches and mountains picked up in March and accelerated in recent weeks, airline executives said at an industry conference this week.

“The surge in travel is just now starting to happen,” said Frontier Airlines’ chief executive,

Barry Biffle.

“Memorial Day is going to be big; the Fourth of July is going to be…
U.S. airline-passenger numbers are forecast to average as many as two million a day through the Memorial Day holiday, testing the ability of airlines and airports to handle infrequent and, in some cases, unruly fliers.

While domestic air-travel numbers last Christmas were only half those in 2019, recent Transportation Security Administration counts have them now hovering around 90% of pre-pandemic levels. The TSA screened 1.9 million passengers last Sunday, a 14-month high.

Bookings from leisure travelers heading to the beaches and mountains picked up in March and accelerated in recent weeks, airline executives said at an industry conference this week.

“The surge in travel is just now starting to happen,” said Frontier Airlines’ chief executive, Barry Biffle. “Memorial Day is going to be big; the Fourth of July is going to be crazy.”

Many holiday-weekend travelers are infrequent fliers, and now some are coming back after more than a year of staying close to home. American Airlines Group Inc., the world’s largest

DEMOCRATS LOOK TO MEDICAID EXPANSION fights to juice 2022 races in battleground states like Wisconsin and Florida, and even red ones like Missouri. They have been boosted by several state ballot referendums showing popular support for the expansions, and a carrot-and-stick approach from the Biden administration aided by American Rescue Plan funds. Resistant Republicans are tying the expansions to other Democratic policies, like expanded unemployment benefits, that they say are hampering the economic recovery from the pandemic.

Wisconsin Democratic Gov. Tony Evers this week called the GOP-controlled state legislature into session to consider accepting around $1 billion in federal funds to expand Medicaid eligibility to roughly 91,000 more people. The GOP-led legislative chambers gaveled out within seconds. Statehouse Speaker Robin Vos said the expansion would “trap people in the life of poverty.” Evers and his allies plan to make the Republican rejection of Medicaid money a campaign issue for 2022, when Evers is up for reelection, and they wasted no time doing so after the session. “Republican legislators should have to explain to Wisconsinites across our state why they made the decision they did today,” Evers said.

In Florida, organizers are collecting signatures for a Medicaid ballot initiative that could juice turnout for other races, including governor and U.S. senator. Missouri Democrats hope for a boost in the uphill race to replace Sen. Roy Blunt after Republican legislators declined to provide funds for Medicaid expansion despite voters approving a 2020 constitutional amendment requiring the state to expand coverage. In Georgia, advocacy groups are running ads pressuring Gov. Brian Kemp, who says he has already boosted access to healthcare (but not taken federal funding). He is also up for re-election in 2022.

Support for Medicaid expansions doesn’t necessarily correlate to support for Democrats, however: In 2018, Nebraska voters expanded Medicaid with 53% in favor, the same day Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts won 59% in his re-election bid.

THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT should take decisive action to deal with possible antitrust law violations in the meatpacking industry, a bipartisan group of senators and House members said. In a Thursday letter led by South Dakota Republican Sen. Mike Rounds and Minnesota Democratic Sen. Tina Smith, the legislators said the Justice Department needed to produce results from its continuing review of a handful of companies in the beef-processing market. They cite the confluence of rising consumer prices, plummeting cattle prices, and large profits for the companies that “defy expectations of market fundamentals.” A spokesperson for the North American Meat Institute, a major industry group, said the group’s members “and their livestock suppliers benefit from a fair and competitive market.”
WASHINGTON—Senate Republicans blocked the creation of a bipartisan, independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob, after GOP leaders urged colleagues to reject it.

The bill needed 60 votes to advance in the evenly divided Senate, thanks to the chamber’s longstanding filibuster rule. That means 10 Republicans would have had to vote with all 50 members of the Democratic caucus to allow the bill to proceed. Only six did, and the legislation fell short, with 54 votes in favor, 35 against and 11 senators not voting.

The six Republicans who voted in favor of proceeding with the legislation were Sens. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Rob Portman of Ohio, Mitt Romney of Utah and Ben Sasse of Nebraska. All but Mr. Portman had voted to convict former President Donald Trump in February at his impeachment trial on charges of inciting insurrection on Jan. 6. Mr. Trump was acquitted.

Two Democrats weren’t present for the vote: Sens. Patty Murray of Washington state and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona. Nine Republicans also didn’t vote, including Sens. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Richard Burr of North Carolina, both of whom were among the seven GOP senators who voted to convict Mr. Trump earlier this year.

The Senate had been scheduled to vote on the commission Thursday but procedural delays on separate legislation forced it into Friday. Sens. Murray and Toomey said Friday that they had missed the vote because of family obligations, but they would have voted yes.