The budget airline is the first corporate casualty of the Iran war.Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up here to get The Daily Prospect Monday through Friday. [link removed]

[link removed]

**MAY 5, 2026**

Click to read this email in your browser. [link removed]

This is a special edition of our newsletter, Aftermath, that we inaugurated last month to study the multiplying ramifications of the war in Iran. So far, we’ve covered oil, natural gas, plastics, fertilizer, aluminum, and many more supply shocks, as well as whether the world will cope by turning away from fossil fuel energy. We think it’s a critical addition to your daily news diet. You can sign up for the newsletter and read all the archives at prospect.org/aftermath [link removed].

**–David Dayen, executive editor**

[link removed]

Jeff Amy/AP Photo

The First Corporate Casualty of the Iran War [link removed]

Spirit Airlines went out of business [link removed] early Saturday. Passengers across the country were stranded in the middle of their travel, and 17,000 workers lost their jobs, after a $500 million lifeline from the Trump administration fell through.

For context, the war that was the proximate cause for Spirit’s demise has cost $25 billion thus far [link removed], about 50 times as much as the rescue package for Spirit would have been. This has not stopped a very self-interested group of financiers and corporate Democrats—some of them aligned with the very bondholders who rejected a Spirit rescue—from reaching back two years to come up with a different cause for Spirit’s death, part of a factional fight about antitrust enforcement and corporate power.

Their argument is transparently ridiculous, and it’s worth documenting the whole history to make clear what destroyed Spirit, why Wall Street Democrats are claiming otherwise, and why Spirit will be only the first of a cascade of airline bankruptcies if the consolidation of the industry is not broken.

Spirit has been limping along (which didn’t stop them from giving their executives giant bonuses [link removed]), but it’s very clear what the kill shot was: jet fuel prices, which have more than doubled [link removed] since the war began. Jet fuel refining capacity rather than an oil shortage per se is the major problem here, as many refiners in the Middle East have been damaged. The global nature of the commodity affects all airlines on price, even if some countries have a larger supply issue, which is why you’re seeing dire statements in Europe [link removed] about having just six weeks of fuel left. In the U.S., it’s mainly been a price shock; even the big boys are reducing earnings forecasts [link removed], cutting flights, and raising fares.

Continue reading this story [link removed]

****ON OUR SITE****

Drone dominance isn’t the vital lesson of Ukraine [link removed].

**Manpower is still the most critical battlefield resource in a war.**

 A state appellate court in Pennsylvania held that the state’s ban on Medicaid funding for abortion services violated the state constitution [link removed].

[link removed]

[link removed]

[link removed]

[link removed]

[link removed]

[link removed]

Copyright (c) 2026 The American Prospect. All rights reserved.**The American Prospect, Inc., 1225 I Street NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC xxxxxx, United States**
You are receiving this newsletter because you have signed up for our service.
To opt out of membership messaging from the

**Prospect**, use our marketing opt-out form [link removed].
To manage your newsletter preferences, use our preference management page [link removed].
To unsubscribe from all American Prospect emails, including newsletters, follow this link to unsubscribe [link removed].

Sent to: [email protected]

Unsubscribe [link removed]

The American Prospect, Inc., 1225 I Street NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC xxxxxx, United States