The Federal Aviation Administration’s temporary closure of the airspace over El Paso International Airport was lifted Wednesday morning, but the circumstances that led to it were still in dispute, as lawmakers and other elected officials questioned the Trump administration’s explanation for the disruptive action.
Sean Duffy, the transportation secretary, and officials from the White House and the Pentagon said Wednesday that Mexican cartel drones breached U.S. airspace, prompting the temporary closure of airspace over El Paso.
But two people briefed on the situation said the shutdown of the airspace was prompted when the Defense Department, operating out of Fort Bliss, a nearby Army base, mobilized new counter-drone technology. That prompted the F.A.A., out of concern for the safety of other aircraft in the region, to close the nearby skies, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.
And when asked about Trump administration claims that a Mexican cartel drone incursion into the United States caused the airspace closure, President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico said that “there is no information about the use of drones at the border.” The F.A.A.’s original notice said that the closure would not affect Mexican airspace.
The two people briefed added that F.A.A. officials had told the Pentagon they needed 24 hours to perform a safety risk assessment, warning that without the extra time, the agency would be forced to shut down the airspace. The military went ahead with its counter-drone technology rollout anyway, the people said.
The F.A.A.’s decision Tuesday night to close the airspace up to 18,000 feet, initially for 10 days, left El Paso officials blindsided.
“I want to be very, very clear that this should’ve never happened,” Mayor Renard Johnson of El Paso said in a news conference Wednesday morning. “You cannot restrict airspace over a major city without coordinating with the city, the airport, the hospitals, the community leadership.”
“That failure to communicate is unacceptable,” he added.
The F.A.A. and the Transportation Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment; a Pentagon spokesman repeated the military’s assertion that it had responded to a drone incursion.
The Trump administration has been vocal about its plans to fight Mexican drug cartels and neutralize the drones some are using as part of their operations.
In July, Steven Willoughby, deputy director of the counter-drone program at the Homeland Security Department, testified before Congress that 27,000 drones had flown within 500 meters of the border over six months in 2024, piloted by organizations hostile to law enforcement.
Those drones can cause major disruptions to American infrastructure, Mr. Willoughby said, adding that his program works with the F.A.A. “to properly coordinate the use of each piece of equipment at specific locations and times to ensure that impacts to the national airspace system are minimized.”
On Wednesday, many officials questioned why a particular drone incursion would have prompted such a sweeping response from the F.A.A.
“There have been drone incursions from Mexico going back to as long as drones existed,” Representative Veronica Escobar, the Texas Democrat representing El Paso in Congress, said at a news conference. “This is not unusual, and there was nothing extraordinary about any drone incursion into the U.S. that I’m aware of.”
Even some of the Trump administration’s closest allies on Capitol Hill were reserving judgment.
In a statement on social media, Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas and the chairman of the committee that oversees aviation, said he was working to “gather more information about this morning’s temporary airspace closure in El Paso,” and was “hopeful more details can be publicly shared in the coming days on interagency coordination.”
The F.A.A. and the Transportation Department did not offer an explanation as to why the airspace over El Paso was initially closed for 10 days. That is far longer than closures that are typical for any individual drone incursion, and not a standard length of time for an F.A.A. closure, according to people familiar with the protocols.
In general, the F.A.A. goes to great lengths to avoid closing airports to traffic, as unplanned closures, even when they happen for just a few hours, can wreak havoc on air travel. Even in a high-risk security situation, F.A.A. airspace closures are usually limited.
On Jan. 3, for example, when the U.S. military captured Nicolás Maduro, the Venezuelan leader, and his wife, the F.A.A. issued emergency orders barring U.S. flights from operating in the region around Venezuela and closing U.S.-controlled airspace in other parts of the Caribbean for only 24 hours.
Luke Broadwater, Aishvarya Kavi, Edgar Sandoval and J. David Goodman contributed reporting.
Karoun Demirjian is a breaking news reporter for The Times.
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