After what will surely go down as one of the worst public relations disasters in American history, automakers General Motors and Ford say that they will ditch the private luxury jets for their executives. They’ll now apparently drive from Detroit to beg the American people to bail them out.
Ford and General Motors will sell their fleet of corporate luxury jets, the two struggling auto companies announced today.
The move comes two weeks after ABC News revealed Ford CEO Alan Mulally, GM CEO Rick Wagoner and Chrysler CEO Robert Nardelli traveled to Washington in private jets to plead poverty and ask Congress for $25 billion in taxpayer money. …
In a statement, GM said, “Due to significant cutbacks over the past months, GM travel volume no longer justified a dedicated corporate aircraft operation.”
“We don’t use them much anyway,” said GM spokesperson Mike Meyerand. “It saves us a lot of money to get out of this business,” he said.
Ford also confirmed that it has decided to sell its five corporate aircraft.
As Ed Morrissey asks, what will happen to Alan Mulally now? Mulally apparently refused to move to Detroit, so he flies by private jet every weekend from the Motor City to his home in Seattle. Seeing as he’s promising to accept just $1 a year in compensation in exchange for the bailout, how is he going to get around? Should be interesting.
by Stephan Tawney on Tue, Dec 2, 2008