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President Trump seems to be implying that him being strict on commercial aviation led to 2017 having been "the best and safest year on record". When reading carefully, he does not claim that outright; it's merely a juxtaposition of two claims.

Since taking office I have been very strict on Commercial Aviation. Good news - it was just reported that there were Zero deaths in 2017, the best and safest year on record!

—Donald J. Trump, 3:13 pm · 2 Jan 2018

I've asked about the second part; how about the first part?

Has president Donald J. Trump been "very strict" on commercial aviation?

Specifically,

Has Trump, or any member of Trump's administration, taken any action aimed to improve aviation safety?

SQB
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  • Clearly an opinion based question, there's no standard by which to judge objectively what "very strict" looks like (or "not so strict") for that matter. – Sklivvz Jan 14 '18 at 22:30
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    Now the question is not notable. It's not what Trump is claiming. Beyond not being notable (nor answering the original question as posed), the second question posed is asking to prove a negative and the first is asking about motivation. What "being strict" means a mere opinion. One could think that deregulating aviation safety is "being strict" if their ideal is anarchy. – Sklivvz Jan 15 '18 at 09:05
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    @Sklivvz We are allowed to make reasonable interpretations of statements, even Trump's. No reasonable person would say that total deregulation was 'being strict', even if their ideal was anarchy – DJClayworth Jan 15 '18 at 14:25
  • @DJClayworth I disagree that taking a single source statement, stretching it to the point you like and that answering is "allowed" or "notable" or "the point of this site". The notability rules are there exactly to prevent this kind of straw man arguments. – Sklivvz Jan 15 '18 at 14:44
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    @Sklivvz It's not stretching a point to take a reasonable, logical, interpretation of what a person says and look to see if that statement is true. We have already established that Trump's pronouncements are notable. – DJClayworth Jan 15 '18 at 15:38
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    Trump clearly claims that he has taken some action with regard to commercial aviation safety. Has any action been taken that relates to aviation safety, which could reasonably improve this, and which could reasonably be said to have originated with Trump or those close to him? This isn't rocket science, and can easily be checked. It may be there isn't a clear answer, but that is no reason not to ask the question. – DJClayworth Jan 15 '18 at 16:06
  • @DJClayworth I had the second part in there because had he taken some action that is clearly detrimental to commercial aviation safety, he would not have been "very strict". In other words, prohibiting purple paint while at the same time saying that it's up to local residents to clean up the walls, would not constitute being "very strict" on graffiti. – SQB Jan 15 '18 at 16:28
  • It's now an implied claim... which we don't allow.The problem is that "being strict " is not a clear factual statement that is debunkable. The problem with assuming all Trump says is notable (as I warned) is that single source statements lead to questions that can't be fixed, like this one. Has Trump in another occasion clarified what he means here? That would help. – Sklivvz Jan 16 '18 at 07:56
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    @Oddthinking I fully agree that "very strict" is hard to quantify. But why can't we start with "any action aimed to improve aviation safety" and "foregoing any action detrimental to aviation safety"? I can't possibly fathom what The Donald would think to be "very strict", but if he hasn't done anything _at all_, or _has done_ something clearly detrimental, we could rule this claim as false, couldn't we? – SQB Jan 16 '18 at 09:53
  • @SQB You are putting on us the onus of finding out what Trump meant in order to answer the question... what is he referring to when he says he's been very strict? – Sklivvz Jan 16 '18 at 23:00
  • @Sklivvz no, I've tried to formulate what I would find an acceptable interpretation of "being strict". I've edited it a couple of times, mostly because I'm not a US citizen and not familiar with the workings of the US administration. But it keeps coming down to "has Trump taken any action aimed to improve (commercial) aviation safety and has he _not_ taken any action detrimental to it?" – SQB Jan 18 '18 at 09:44
  • But the problem remains that that is not necessarily what *he* meant. He may well mean that the person that he appointed to oversee the department has strict standards. You are developing your own definition of "very strict". But your claim isn't notable. If you want to fact check your point, you need to find someone who is saying that there were or were not regulatory/legal changes caused by Trump. – Brythan Feb 24 '18 at 03:35
  • @Brythan and that is exactly what I'm asking. Has president Trump done _anything_ that could qualify as "strict"? – SQB Feb 24 '18 at 07:11
  • @Oddthinking not to single you out, but [this question whether children were safer in the good old days](https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/q/8033/16121) has the same (IMHO) problems of interpretation. [Your answer there](https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/a/9469/16121) solved that problem quite well. What would prevent a similar approach here? "Trump (or his administration) has done / set in motion / ordered X, Y, and Z related to civil aviation. X is regarded by experts as an improvement, Y as detrimental, opinions on Z are inconclusive." – SQB Feb 26 '18 at 11:02
  • How widely is this claim defining "any member of the Trump administration?" I would normally consider the FAA, like other executive agencies, to be part of the administration and they make thousands upon thousands of "action aimed to improve aviation safety" annually, both before and during the Trump administration. That being said, it seems like the bolded question at the end is very different from the title question and from Trump's claim (and the answer to those questions is different.) – reirab Nov 15 '19 at 00:05

1 Answers1

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This answer is making use of Daniel R Hicks' links in the comments of the question.

The Claim

Donald Trump's tweet's phrasing "Since taking office I have been very strict on Commercial Aviation." is, perhaps typically, not very precise. Asked about details, the White House released a statement quoted by factcheck.org:

“Last year, the President announced his initiative to modernize Air Traffic Control and under his leadership, the Department of Homeland Security released enhanced security measures to ensure safer commercial air travel,” said Raj Shah, principal deputy White House press secretary.

Actions from Trump's administration

The President's "initiative" is a proposal to privatize the Federal Aviation Administration’s Air Traffic Control system. It has not been implemented.

The security measures from Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are:

  • From March to July: restrictions on

    passengers carrying laptops in cabins on nine primarily Middle Eastern airlines to address the potential threat of hidden explosives.

  • Since June (or July, depending on sources):

    additional screening of passengers and their personal electronic devices at foreign airports with flights to the U.S.

The Chigaco Tribune also notes that the Trump administration didn't push forward a pending "important aviation safety regulation" proposed by the Obama White House about shipping lithium batteries.

Possible impact on flights safety

Privatization of air traffic control

The privatization of the Air Traffic Control system has not happened to this date, hence it is fair to say it had zero impact on flights' safety in 2017.

Whether this eventual privatization would enhance security is at least a very long shot. According to the Chigaco Tribune:

Supporters of privatization have been clear that the proposal is aimed at speeding air traffic modernization and is unrelated to safety.

Measures from DHS

The measures from DHS aim "to prevent terrorist attacks". They concern only the flights into the US from nine airlines. They do are safety measures, but one cannot prove whether they have or haven't deterred any intended terrorist attack on one of those flights. There sure has been no such attack in 2017, but neither has there been any during the past decades (even the attacks on 9/11/2001 hijacked domestic flights that would not have been in the scope of those measures).

Speculations aside, factcheck.org politely notes that

The White House didn’t provide any evidence that the DHS security changes had any effect on the level of airline accidents.

Reuters reports :

Current and former aviation safety officials said Trump was not responsible for last year’s unblemished commercial passenger jet safety record, citing years-long improvements in safety and the fact that no U.S. passenger airliner has had a fatal crash since 2009. Aviation Safety Network President Harro Ranter, whose group tracks aviation incidents, said in an email: ”It’s impossible to link the worldwide level of safety directly to recent U.S. policy changes.”

and concludes with Bryan Cranston's tweet adressed to Donald Trump:

“Your active participation monitoring the flight patterns and safety regulations was greatly appreciated. In 2018 could you please turn your efforts toward preventing wildfires and hurricanes?”

(maybe this tweet is out-of-scope, but I like the humour)

Summing up

Trump's administration policy about flights' safety cannot be considered as revolutionary. Whether the few measures taken by DHS in 2017 can be qualified as "very strict" is subjective, but they most probably had no noticeable impact on the excellent safety record of 2017 (no death worldwide) that continues a years-long trend of improving aviation's security.

The White House administration has not provided any proof of such an impact that could justify Donald Trump's bragging tweet.

SQB
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Evargalo
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  • The question specifically points out the fact that there wasn't a direct claim of causation (likely due the "impossibility" of linkage). The claims of "strict" action and no deaths were correct. – Paul Draper Jan 15 '20 at 00:09
  • PaulDraper: 1.Trump's tweet accolates a first sentence self-praising his action and a second sentence about flight safety in 2017. The implicit causation link is, well, implicit, but certainly voluntary. 2. If you can argue that the claim of very strict action is correct, you can put that in your own answer, but I will stand by my answer : such a statement is a very long shot. – Evargalo Jan 15 '20 at 06:32