Transportation head vows to find 'root cause' of ground stop. Trump breaks his silence on breakdown

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President Donald Trump's transportation secretary says the government wants to be certain it determines the “root cause” of the problems that led to the grounding of planes across the United States before making broad fixes to air traffic control

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The government wants to be certain it determines the “root cause” of the problems that led to the grounding of planes across the United States before making broad fixes to air traffic control, the nation's transportation chief said Sunday. President Donald Trump broke his silence about the extraordinary disruption that snarled airline travel and raised troubling questions about how a system so integral to the country could be so vulnerable.

Officials are analyzing two routers installed in recent weeks at Federal Aviation Administration facilities in Arkansas and Texas, according to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, who during appearances on five television news shows stepped up his push for Congress to provide billions more to upgrade a system he said had been neglected for decades.

He was the administration's public face in seeking to assure travelers that it was safe to fly as airports and airlines worked to restore normal operations after Friday's nationwide ground stop.

“We’re going to figure out what was the root cause and then move forward from there,” he said.

Trump has not commented publicly or on social media about ground stop was ordered Friday afternoon. He had issued statements on social media about unrelated matters while frustrated passengers were left stranded and his team and airlines scrambled for a return to normal travel operations.

Trump weighed in Sunday morning in a post on Truth Social, saying that his administration has begun upgrading the air traffic control system, but that task should not be done in “drips and drabs.” The Republican-controlled Congress approved $12.5 billion for the FAA as part of the party's sweeping tax cut package last year, but Duffy has characterized that money as a down payment on a broader overhaul of the aging system.

“If Congress approves the desperately needed money for Air Traffic Control, we…

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