{"id":356,"date":"2026-06-10T19:40:22","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T19:40:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alaskamovingnetwork.com\/?p=356"},"modified":"2026-06-10T19:40:22","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T19:40:22","slug":"federal-appeals-judges-reject-lawsuit-against-alaska-airlines-by-former-state-senator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alaskamovingnetwork.com\/?p=356","title":{"rendered":"Federal appeals judges reject lawsuit against Alaska Airlines by former state senator"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit has upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit by former Alaska state Sen. Lora Reinbold, R-Eagle River, against Alaska Airlines.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/alaskamovingnetwork.com\/?p=354\">The Anchorage Weekender: Knitting with neighbors, a blossom bash and 7 more local events<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Alaska Airlines banned Reinbold in 2021 for refusing to follow its masking policies during the COVID-19 pandemic emergency. She sued the airline in 2023, after leaving office.<\/p>\n<p>By email, Reinbold said she was dissatisfied with the court\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAlaska Airlines is the sole carrier to Juneau, which puts it in a position to control access to government, courts, medical care, and family for every Alaskan \u2014 and the same dynamic plays out in Hawaii and other places where a single carrier holds the keys,\u201d she wrote. \u201cA monopoly carrier with that kind of power needs accountability \u2014 including to the federal disability law it tried to ignore. The Ninth Circuit did not appear to grasp how serious that question is. This case deserved a thorough review and an assessment of the broad future impacts.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Reinbold delivered oral arguments in April, the panel issued its order May 20, and Reinbold on June 3 filed a motion on June 3 asking the full court to hear the case. That motion is pending.<\/p>\n<p>Reinbold, who represented herself in the suit, noted that Alaska Airlines was the sole commercial air carrier between Anchorage and Juneau during the 2021 legislative session, and her ban effectively denied her the ability to travel to Anchorage by commercial air flight.<\/p>\n<p>She ultimately drove across Canada and took a state ferry to reach Juneau.<\/p>\n<p>Alaska Airlines\u2019 monopoly, combined with its implementation of federal rules, made it a state actor and thus subject to constitutional claims, Reinbold argued.<\/p>\n<p>Furthermore, the airline gave her no opportunity to appeal the ban, she said.<\/p>\n<p>An Alaska District Court judge dismissed the case in 2024, and the judge rejected Reinbold\u2019s attempt to amend her complaint and keep the case a live issue.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/alaskamovingnetwork.com\/?p=352\">Alaska\u2019s minimum wage will increase next month<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen corporations enforce government policy, hand-in-hand with the state, constitutional protections such as fair notice and due process must still apply,\u201d she said by email.<\/p>\n<p>During court arguments, Alaska Airlines raised a variety of procedural issues with Reinbold\u2019s complaint and argued that it was not a government agency and thus not liable for alleged violations of the U.S. Constitution.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPlaintiff was entitled to her personal views about COVID-19,\u201d the airline\u2019s attorneys wrote in 2023. \u201cShe was not, however, empowered to invoke her personal notions to evade or disregard federally mandated requirements for air travel that applied to all other Alaska Airlines guests during a worldwide pandemic.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The airline was represented in court by attorney Richard Grotch, who said Reinbold did have a doctor\u2019s note indicating that she did not need to wear a mask, but she never indicated that during booking, as the airline required.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s no constitutionally guaranteed right to fly. There\u2019s certainly no constitutionally guaranteed right to fly Alaska,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/alaskamovingnetwork.com\/?p=350\">Dancing through tradition: Celebration 2026 in photos<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Alaska Airlines banned Reinbold in 2021 for refusing to follow its masking policies during the COVID-19 pandemic emergency. She sued the airline in 2023, after leaving office.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":355,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Federal appeals judges reject lawsuit against Alaska Airlines by former state senator - Alaska Moving Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/alaskamovingnetwork.com\/?p=356\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Federal appeals judges reject lawsuit against Alaska Airlines by former state senator - Alaska Moving Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Alaska Airlines banned Reinbold in 2021 for refusing to follow its masking policies during the COVID-19 pandemic emergency. 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Lora Reinbold, R-Eagle River, speaks Tuesday, May 10, 2022 on the floor of the Alaska Senate at the Alaska State Capitol in Juneau, Alaska. 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