Flight information Monday indicated {that a} New England Patriots workforce aircraft made a visit to and from Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, the notorious U.S. navy base that’s now getting used as a detention middle for deportees and another immigrants the Trump administration shuttled in another country and to a notorious Salvadoran prison.
Two planes owned by the workforce can be found for constitution, and Patriots proprietor Robert Kraft has additionally used them for private tasks like assist missions. But it surely’s not clear what led to the Guantánamo Bay journey. A spokesperson for Kraft’s firm informed HuffPost that “there have been no detainees on the aircraft,” however that the Patriots present constitution operator does work with the Division of Protection to move navy personnel and others for “no monetary achieve.”
The Trump administration has used Guantánamo Bay to detain deportees from the US, and in addition as a waypoint for some of the immigrants despatched — with out due course of, felony expenses or different authorized protections — to the Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT, a brutal Salvadoran mega-prison.
Constitution flights are a key a part of the administration’s “mass deportation” equipment, and ProPublica recently reported on flight attendants for the constitution firm International Crossing Airways, used to “rock bands, sports activities groups and sun-seekers,” who’ve discovered themselves as a substitute working deportation flights. Constitution flights have been used for immigration enforcement by previous administrations as properly.
The Patriots aircraft’s Guantánamo journey was flagged Monday by customers on the social media website Bluesky, together with the automated account GTMO Watch and the person JJ in DC. The Boston-based neighborhood information web site UniversalHub also flagged the flights.
Flight records indicate that one of many two Patriots planes — both of which have Patriots imagery and workforce colours painted across the exterior of the aircraft — took off from Perot Subject Fort Value Alliance Airport in Texas round 6 a.m. native time, and arrived at Guantánamo Bay just a few hours later.
It spent 4 hours on the bottom on the American navy outpost in Cuba, then arrived on the Biggs Military Airfield on the Fort Bliss navy base in El Paso after a five-hour return flight, the information indicated.
In an announcement to HuffPost, a spokesperson for Kraft Sports activities + Leisure, the Patriots’ mother or father firm, acknowledged that its present constitution firm supervisor does use the Patriots aircraft “when chartering to the Division of Protection to maneuver navy personnel in addition to different authorities companies with no monetary achieve to the group.”
The spokesperson, Anisha Chakrabarti, didn’t reply to extra detailed follow-up questions, although she denied that the aircraft had been used to move detainees underneath its present constitution supervisor.
“The New England Patriots aircraft was not used for any form of deportation flight and there have been no detainees on the aircraft,” Chakrabarti wrote in an electronic mail. “Underneath our present constitution supervisor, neither of the Patriots planes have ever been used for that function.”
“The workforce planes are operated by an expert constitution firm when they don’t seem to be in use by the workforce,” Chakrabarti’s assertion continued. “This firm manages all logistics, bookings, and operations independently. The New England Patriots group isn’t concerned in, nor does it approve, sanction, or coordinate the makes use of of the aircrafts when they’re chartered for non-team functions. The constitution firm makes use of the Patriots planes as a part of their stock when chartering to the Division of Protection to maneuver navy personnel in addition to different authorities companies with no monetary achieve to the group.”
Questions despatched to numerous Trump administration companies weren’t instantly returned.
Final yr, the Patriots entered a long-term settlement with Omni Air Worldwide, a subsidiary of Air Transport Providers Group, to deal with two Boeing 767-300 passenger plane for workforce journey and different chartered flights — together with “humanitarian and goodwill flights on behalf of the Kraft household, and as accessible for Omni’s different constitution prospects,” in line with a press release.
Kym Parks, director of promoting at Air Transport Providers Group, referred HuffPost to the remark “from the plane house owners,” however declined to reply particular questions.
“Because of the potential nature of our missions, we don’t affirm any flight or contract info,” Parks stated.
Earlier reporting from The Intercept and Quartz detailed Omni Air Worldwide’s work with the U.S. authorities, together with deportation flights. The College of Washington Middle for Human Rights has published extensive research on the federal government’s use of constitution flights for deportations, and has written about monitoring Omni-operated planes that seem to have been used for each deportation flights and sports activities groups.
Previous to the Omni Air settlement, the Patriots coordinated workforce and constitution flights by means of one other firm, Jap Airways, although the events had been involved in a legal dispute in 2023.
Robert Kraft, whose Kraft Group LLC was a one-time $1 million donor to Donald Trump’s 2017 inaugural committee, said last October that he was “very upset” by the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol, and that he hadn’t spoken to Trump since.
The Wall Road Journal reported in April that Kraft had reached out to Trump on behalf of Brad Karp, the chairman of the regulation agency Paul Weiss — which finally struck a deal with Trump to exchange company coverage adjustments and professional bono work to keep away from being focused by the administration. The deal is a part of a collection of Trump assaults on regulation companies, during which he’s pressured them for political concessions in what Democratic legislators have called “an unlawful shakedown of the authorized occupation.”
Kraft is a longtime shopper of Paul Weiss, the Journal reported. Kraft’s son, Josh Kraft, is at the moment running a campaign to unseat incumbent Boston Mayor Michelle Wu.
In 2022, a Patriots workforce aircraft was reportedly used for a number of deportation flights to Honduras.
Individually, Kraft and the Patriots group have publicly acknowledged utilizing the planes for particular functions like flying masks into Boston on the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, delivering aid to Haiti, and flying school shooting survivors and family members of taking pictures casualties to the 2018 “March for Our Lives” rally.
