United Airlines Agent at San Francisco Airport Threatens Passenger with ICE Call in Heated Exchange
A United Airlines agent at San Francisco International Airport (SFO) got into a nasty confrontation with a customer on Wednesday after she allegedly threatened to call ICE on the passenger and said, “You don’t act like a citizen.” A video of the confrontation has gone viral on the social media platform Reddit, although the full events leading up to the altercation weren’t caught on camera. Instead, the footage starts with the agent saying to the passenger: “Maybe we should call ICE on you… because you don’t act like a citizen, get away.” United Airlines threatens to call ICE on customer then walks up to him and pushes phone away by u/666TripleSick in unitedairlines While the passenger is filming the interaction, the agent is also holding up her own company-issued smartphone, apparently recording the passenger as well. A desperate attempt by a second agent to calm the situation down proved little more than fruitless. The agent says the police might be called if he doesn’t calm down, but this further enrages him. He demands that ICE be called. “I dare you to call ICE on me,” the man screams. The first agent isn’t having any of it. She tells the man to “get out my face!” When he demands she repeat it, she is more than willing to say it, several times over. The man calls her a racist and claims she will be fired, and that he will sue her. It’s an ugly confrontation, and the video cuts off when the agent reaches for the man’s phone, only for him to tug on her arm. Of course, as previously stated, we don’t know what happened in the moments before the video started. Was the passenger incredibly rude and hostile to the agent? Or, potentially, was the agent out of line? The comments on the video are certainly worth a read. In any case, this is not the kind of image a major U.S. airline wants portrayed, especially when the country is currently co-hosting the FIFA World Cup, which has drawn tens of thousands of soccer fans to the United States from around the world. And it’s interactions like this where claims by Chief Executive Scott Kirby that United is the best airline in the world, bar none, don’t match the reality. Remaining calm when confronted by a rude customer can be incredibly difficult, but suggesting you might call ICE on someone, while being filmed, is an odd choice.