A Black first-class passenger aboard Delta Air Lines says she was thrown off a plane on the orders of a white flight attendant who objected to the way the woman looked at her.
One eyewitness said Teresa Hudson Jordan, a Platinum SkyMiles member who was traveling with her young daughter, had been spoken to as if she were a “dog or a slave,” according to a federal discrimination lawsuit reviewed by The Independent.
“This case epitomizes the revolting reality that, even in the year 2025, Black Americans continue to endure the indignity of ‘Flying While Black,’ an experience steeped in humiliation and echoing the dehumanizing degradations of the Jim Crow South,” Jordan’s complaint states.
It says the episode hearkened back to “a dark and painful era where the simple act of a Black person looking a white person in the eye could provoke violent repercussions.”
Jordan was “singled out, verbally assaulted, and subjected to public disgrace” in what the complaint describes as a “grotesque display of racial hostility.” The 53-year-old and her daughter have since been in therapy to “manage the trauma resulting from this incident,” according to the complaint, which was filed Wednesday in Manhattan federal court.
In an email on Thursday, a Delta spokesperson said, “While we have no specific comment on this pending litigation, Delta has zero tolerance for discrimination of any form.”
Jordan and her daughter were aboard Delta flight 5792, from Greenville, South Carolina, to New York City, on March 27, 2024, the complaint states. It says Jordan was accompanying her child to an important doctor’s appointment at Mount Sinai Hospital, and that the two were seated in the fourth row of the airplane.
“After the doors closed and the flight began to taxi to the runway, Ms. Jordan leaned forward to say something to her daughter,” the complaint explains.
At that moment, an unidentified flight attendant happened to be walking by, and Jordan “looked up at her and made eye contact, but did not say a word,” the complaint continues.
“Without any provocation whatsoever, Flight Attendant Doe, a Caucasian woman, began screaming at Ms. Jordan, yelling: ‘Don’t look at me like that! Don’t eye me up and down. If you can’t comply with my commands, then I’ll turn this plane around and we can go back to the gate!!’” the complaint goes on. “Ms. Jordan responded by saying, ‘I comply.’ Despite this, Flight Attendant ‘Doe’ continued her unprovoked verbal attack on Ms. Jordan, stating, ‘You can catch another flight. Do you understand?!!’”
Jordan did not immediately respond, according to the complaint. That’s when the flight attendant allegedly shouted, “That was not a rhetorical question!!” Jordan again stated, “I comply,” adding, “I’ve already said that and everyone has heard me,” the complaint states.
“Thank you!!” the flight attendant replied in a sarcastic tone before returning to the back of the cabin, according to the complaint.
Jordan remained seated throughout the entire interaction and never once raised her voice, the complaint contends. It says she was “stunned” by the flight attendant’s “aggressive, threatening and bullying tone, which felt both violent and demeaning,” and that numerous other passengers watched, in astonishment, as the flight attendant hurled abuse at Jordan.
One of them later wrote to Delta, saying, “I’ve never seen/heard a flight attendant act so aggressively towards a passenger. It was disturbing and unwarranted,” the complaint states. Another wrote that the flight attendant “had treated Ms. Jordan as if she were a ‘dog or a slave.’”
“Notwithstanding the outrageous conduct of Flight Attendant Doe, Ms. Jordan never spoke back, as she knew that her daughter had a critical medical appointment in New York that she needed to make, and she did not want to take any chance of missing that appointment,” according to the complaint.
Still, it alleges, the flight attendant was not yet finished with Jordan. Following the one-sided exchange, the complaint says she “willfully and maliciously lied to other Delta employees on the plane, including the Captain, telling them that Ms. Jordan was an unruly, disruptive passenger who had refused to comply with her demands.” The pilot then stopped the plane and headed back to the terminal to have Jordan removed from the flight, the complaint states.
A gate agent brusquely ordered Jordan off the aircraft, and she and her daughter “calmly” obeyed, gathering their carry-on bags from the overhead compartment, according to the complaint. It says their removal from the flight “jeopardized” their ability to get Jordan’s daughter to her doctor’s appointment the next morning, but does not specify whether or not they made it there successfully.
“Ms. Jordan and her daughter experienced extreme humiliation, embarrassment and shame when being thrown off the plane, as all passengers stared at Ms. Jordan and her daughter as they were being removed,” the complaint says, noting that four other passengers in the first class cabin came to Jordan’s defense. They objected “vehemently” to the flight attendant’s behavior, the complaint contends, insisted that neither Jordan nor her daughter had done anything wrong, and later submitted written statements to Delta’s CEO and COO, “detailing the egregious and highly improper conduct” the pair had been subjected to.
Yet, Delta never contacted Jordan about what happened, according to the complaint, which claims the carrier has “wholly failed” in making things right.
“As a result of this incident, both Ms. Jordan and her daughter have suffered severe emotional distress, including symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, characterized by nightmares, severe anxiety, and a persistent state of hyper-vigilance,” the complaint states, noting that Jordan has since avoided air travel “whenever possible.”
She is asking the court for compensatory damages and punitive damages, along with damages for emotional distress, in an amount to be determined at trial, as well as an injunction requiring Delta to implement anti-discrimination training for its flight attendants and staff.
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