A United Airlines captain warned passengers to keep politics off his plane or face removal after a politically-charged "scuffle" broke out aboard a flight from San Francisco to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, late this week.
A passenger recorded cellphone video of the captain’s brief sermon on United flight 1212 and it was posted on Jon Bauer's YouTube account Friday.
"On my friends@wirelessness flight from SFO to Mexico, some kinda scuffle broke out where an individual with a ‘plaid shirt and a camo cap’ said something racist (about being ‘glad to have kept his guns’) to an African American lady, and she began to cry and freak out,” Bauer explained in the caption.
Bauer said crew members “separated the two of them" before the captain of the flight got on the intercom system to deliver a heartfelt plea to his passengers, discouraging further political discussion.
The captain reminded passengers that they were clashing over politics while “in a metal tube at 35,000 feet.”
“I understand that everybody has their opinions. That’s fine. If you support him, great. If you don’t, I understand,” he said about president-elect Donald Trump’s victory.
The captain asked passengers to bear in mind that the trip to Mexico was so people could “have a good time.”
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“And what I do ask is that as people we have the common decency to respect each other’s decisions and to get along,” the captain urged.
He continued, "Nobody is going to change their minds by arguing. And let's keep our opinions to ourselves, on this particular matter, at this particular time. When cooler heads prevail and we can talk and realize we're all human beings and we call can stick together and we can all pull for this country in our own way, then that's what we should do."
If passengers want to “rant” and “rave,” however, the captain insinuated that they would be removed from his plane. "There's another flight tomorrow. You're not going to be on this one," he warned.
His broadcast was met with cheers and applause, and someone can be heard saying, “Hear! Hear!”
United Airlines spokeswoman Megan McCarthy confirmed that an incident occurred on the flight, but didn't comment on the specific nature of the disagreement.
"Our pilot worked to diffuse an argument between customers and worked to get the flight safely to its destination," McCarthy said in a statement to NBC.
