United Airlines Accused Of Booting Wrong Passenger Just Because She Was Asian, Explosive New Lawsuit Alleges

United Airlines has become engulfed in a new discrimination scandal after an Asian passenger claimed she was denied boarding because a flight attendant had accused someone of pushing her. The only link between the passenger and the suspect was that they were both of Asian heritage.

The incident occurred last August when a United flight from Las Vegas to Washington Dulles was forced to divert to Baltimore due to severe weather at its intended destination.

Onboard the aircraft was a group of successful real estate professionals who had just been at a conference in Las Vegas. Two of those realtors were Asian women, and while they work together, they weren’t sitting together on the plane.

The severe weather had caused chaos in Baltimore, where multiple flights had diverted, causing gridlock at the gates and taxiways. All of the passengers were trapped onboard their United plane for an unbearable five hours while waiting for a gate to become available.

During this time, one of the realtor’s coworkers started to feel unwell, sweating profusely and suffering a sudden and intense pain in his chest.

According to a recently filed lawsuit in a Maryland district court, a flight attendant was pretty dismissive about the man’s medical condition and wrote off his symptoms as a panic attack.

One of the Asian realtors challenged the flight attendant over her alleged rudeness, to which she received a “snarky” response before being made to wait a further hour before they could deplane into the terminal.

Another hour passed by in the terminal before passengers were allowed to reboard the aircraft. As the second Asian realtor went to board, she was pulled aside and told she wouldn’t be allowed to fly over an allegation made by one of the flight attendants.

It’s believed that the allegation referred to the earlier interaction between the first Asian realtor and the flight attendant during the medical incident.

United had, however, wrongly identified the second realtor based, it is alleged, on her ethnicity, even though she had been sitting seven rows behind where the exchange of words had taken place and had been reading her Kindle throughout the whole delay.

As her coworkers and friends came to her aid at the gate, all four were denied boarding and marched out of the airport by armed police before being forced to make their way home from Baltimore.

The flight attendant had claimed that one of the party had physically pushed her, although those allegations are denied by the four women in their lawsuit against the airline.

The lawsuit explains: “Traveling in and of itself can be stressful, but for the Plaintiffs, this trip became outrageous due to the extent of the Defendant’s persistent inflammatory behavior, which resulted in Plaintiffs’ severe emotional distress.”

To back up their claim, the women have identified several witnesses, including an off-duty United employee who saw what happened. Their identity has not, however, been revealed for fear that they might face reprisals for ‘snitching’ on a coworker.

Matt’s take

Clearly, there are wildly differing accounts of what occurred onboard this United flight, but in any case, it’s important that the actual suspect is identified, either with their exact name and seat number or a very detailed description which doesn’t just rely on the suspect’s race.

This lawsuit was initially filed in March, but United moved to have the case dismissed as the first complaint failed to state a claim. The plaintiffs have, however, been allowed to submit an amended complaint. United has yet to respond to the amended complaint.