German airline Lufthansa was fined $4 million for discriminating against a group of Orthodox Jews on a flight in 2022, the US Department of Transportation said. This is a record penalty for violating civil rights by an air carrier.
The penalty imposed by the ministry is related to the situation in October 2022, when a group of 128 Orthodox Jews traveling from Budapest to New York were excluded from onward flights during a stopover in Frankfurt.
Lufthansa received a record fine for discrimination against Jews
According to the US Department of Transportation, Lufthansa accused some of these passengers of refusing to comply with the mask-wearing policy. Although this only applied to some of the Jewish passengers, all those wearing skullcaps and sidelocks were barred from boarding, even though many of these people did not know each other.
“Even though many of the passengers did not know each other or travel together, passengers interviewed by investigators said Lufthansa treated them all as if they were one group and denied them boarding due to the alleged inappropriate behavior of several people. Today's punishment is the largest ever ever imposed on an airline by the DOT for violating civil rights,” the department said in a statement.
– No one should be exposed to discrimination when traveling, and today's action sends a clear signal to the aviation industry that we are ready to investigate and take action if passengers' civil rights are violated – said the Minister of Transport USA Pete Buttigieg.
Lufthansa's reaction
Lufthansa apologized for the incident in 2022 and announced that, in cooperation with the American Jewish Committee, it had conducted training on counteracting anti-Semitism.
As reported by Reuters, Lufthansa agreed to pay $2 million, and the Department of Transport said it would recognize the $2 million the airline had previously paid in compensation to passengers.
However, Lufthansa did not admit to any violations and denied that any of its employees discriminated against passengers. Lufthansa claims that as many as 60 passengers on board at any given time disregarded crew instructions, Reuters wrote.
The airline expressed regret and repeatedly publicly apologized for the circumstances surrounding the decision to deny boarding, the US Department of Transportation reported, quoted by Reuters.
The airline said the incident “resulted from an unfortunate series of inaccurate communications, misinterpretations and poor judgments throughout the decision-making process,” the Department of Transport said.
Lufthansa indicated in a statement that it has cooperated fully with the Department of Transportation since the 2022 incident and continues to focus on numerous efforts, including working with the American Jewish Committee to develop “the first such training program in the airline industry for managers and employees in the field of counteracting anti-Semitism and discrimination,” Reuters reported.
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