A key federal lawsuit that aims to block an alliance between Jet Blue and American Airlines heads to court in Boston Tuesday.
The case boils down to an antitrust lawsuit looking at whether the alliance between the two airlines is helping or hurting air travelers, especially at Logan International Airport in Boston.
It looks at a partnership formed between JetBlue and American Airlines in Boston and the New York City area, called the Northeast Alliance. It was created back in 2020, in the midst of the pandemic. At the time, the airlines said it was in an effort to improve options and prices for fliers in Boston and New York.
As part of the alliance, the two airlines share planning on which routes to fly, when to fly them, who will fly them and what size planes to use for each flight.
Get Boston local news, weather forecasts, lifestyle and entertainment stories to your inbox. Sign up for NBC Boston’s newsletters.
The two airlines can also pool their gates, along with their takeoff and landing slots. JetBlue and American have insisted the alliance is not a merger, since the two airlines do not share profits. However, the Department of Justice disagreed, and quickly sued to undo the alliance in U.S. District Court.
Since, several attorneys general, including Massachusetts AG Maura Healey, have joined the lawsuit. They will be arguing in court Tuesday that this alliance is essentially a merger that eliminates competition, reduces options for customers and raises prices.
The lawsuit goes before a judge in federal court in South Boston beginning Tuesday.
