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Activists and faith leaders demanded that a Plano-based company at Love Field Airport end cooperation with federal immigration enforcement on Tuesday.
Members of the Clergy League for Emergency Action and Response (DFW CLEAR), El Movimiento and Democratic Socialists of America hosted a press conference at the Cathedral of Hope near Love Field to denounce reported ICE activity there. They called for Atlantic Aviation to end its relationship with ICE-affiliated carriers and appealed to Dallas officials to intervene.
Atlantic Aviation maintains a facility at Love Field as a fixed-base operator (FBO). Companies like Atlantic provide refueling, hangar space and other logistical support for charter flights. At Love Field, activists say the company’s hangar is being used to support detainee and deportation flights by DHS-contracted carriers.
“As people arrive for the World Cup and other major events, we will proudly showcase our city as a place of hospitality and opportunity,” the Rev. Neil Thomas, lead pastor of Cathedral of Hope, said at the conference. “Yet, at the very same time, through these very same airports, on these very same streets, within sight of celebrations, immigrant members of our community are being removed from their homes and families. This contradiction forces us to ask difficult but necessary questions about who we are as a city.”
Organizers said they have tracked 126 flights related to ICE activity at Love Field this year using tail numbers and flight-tracking software, although those numbers have yet to be independently verified. Social media posts from activists appear to show groups of shackled individuals being taken from buses and loaded onto planes bearing markings of carriers like Eastern Airlines, which is owned by CSI Aviation, the main operator of DHS-contracted flights in the U.S.
“It’s completely unacceptable that Love Field and the Plano headquarters of Atlantic Aviation are colluding with ICE to harm their own neighbors here in Texas,” John Putnam, one of the El Movimiento organizers involved in tracking activity at Atlantic’s hangar, said.
Latin America-bound flights operated by GlobalX, another charter airliner owned by CSI that The New York Times has described as “ICE’s go-to charter airline for deportations,” have also been reported by organizers.
In a statement to the Observer last week, a city spokesperson for Love Field said that immigration enforcement flights are taking place “at major airports across the country.”
“Like these other airports, Dallas Love Field does not manage or oversee federal immigration enforcement operations, nor does the airport have authority over federal decisions regarding the movement of individuals in federal custody,” the statement reads. “The airport remains committed to operating in a safe and lawful manner while serving the region’s transportation needs.”
Putnam responded to that statement Tuesday and called for action by the city.
“It is unacceptable to prioritize working with federal agencies who may be committing or acting legally over protecting their citizens,” he said. “So, if, as you say, quote, ‘the airport remains committed to operating in a safe and lawful manner,’ then you should be investigating to make sure that every single person ICE Air transports on city property does not have a valid asylum plan, habeas corpus claim, visa, greeting card or even citizenship.”
He pointed to reports of individuals claiming U.S. citizenship being deported as especially concerning. He also said that while ICE has used Love Field under previous administrations, the increased enforcement volume and subsequent flights under Trump make the issue hard to ignore.
Organizations like Human Rights First have tracked flight patterns involving immigration enforcement leading up to and during Trump’s second term. Through April 2026, there have been 7,110 flights within or out of the U.S. involving immigration enforcement, according to the organization’s last available monthly report. Human Rights First logged 4,980 of those as domestic flights carrying ICE detainees between detention centers, with the remaining 2,130 related to or explicitly for deportations. Love Field is one of the major airports listed as a venue for the flights in the report.
Compared to April 2021, the first year of the Biden administration, when 1,523 flights were reported through April, it’s more than a 350% increase.
Lanie Olmo, an organizer with the Democratic Socialists of America, said that the domestic flights often arrive from processing centers in areas like El Paso before detainees from the Dallas ICE field office are boarded onto the planes. Domestic flights commonly depart for major ICE hubs like Alexandria, Louisiana, she said.
“These domestic shuttle flights move detained people between detention facilities across the country, from a county jail in Texas to a federal facility in Louisiana, and from a processing center in Arizona to one here in Dallas,” she said.
Immigration attorneys have warned that “shuffle” flights may be used to punish prisoners and keep them from legal representation. They have also warned that the flights could be routed to states like Texas, which has one of the longest backlogs in immigration cases in the country.
Olmo’s message for Atlantic Aviation was simple: stop cooperating with ICE.
“What we are asking about aviation is simple, and it is non-negotiable,” she said. “Stop opening your gates, stop fueling these planes, stop facilitating the removal of our neighbors from the city.”
Atlantic Air was bought in a $10 billion deal by Apollo Global Management in early April. Apollo Global Management did not return a request for comment, and Atlantic representatives directed the Observer to the city’s statement.
While the city has said it does not hold a lease agreement with the company, the preexisting lease holder for Atlantic’s hangar, MLT Development, appears to lack any substantial independence from the FBO and is registered to do business from the company’s Plano headquarters.
“This is unjust — this is not right,” Eric Folkerth, lead pastor for Kessler Park United Methodist Church, said. “And that is why we, as clergy, are standing here today as part of this coalition. Our faith traditions, no matter what they are, demand that we treat the foreign and the migrant and the stranger as one of our own.”
With the city appearing legally bound by its lease for Atlantic’s facility, Folkerth still called on Dallas officials to take action. A protest at the entrance of Love Field is also planned for 11 a.m. Sunday.
“Yes, apparently, there is some kind of contractual agreement between Atlantic Aviation and Love Field. Love Field is owned by the city of Dallas. Love field is owned by you, the people of Dallas. Are you okay with your neighbors being harmed in this way?”
“If not, we invite you to push your members of the city council. We invite you to push the administrators of Love Field to sever their relationship with Atlantic Aviation today.”
