A Naples man told Fox 4 Monday that he believes he and his family were discriminated against when they were boarding a Southwest Airlines flight from Buffalo, NY to Fort Lauderdale on Saturday. He believes that a gate agent kept them from boarding during family boarding because he and his spouse are gay.
"We were baffled and confused," said Grant Morse.
He and his spouse expected to be able to board early and get their 5-year-old daughter and twin 3-year-old boys - as well as Morse's 83-year-old mother - settled on the plane during a call by the gate agent for family boarding. But it didn't happen that way.
"The gate agent immediately said to my spouse, 'this is for family boarding only, you can't wait here, this is for family,'" Morse said.
He said the gate agent started getting harsh and abrupt as she repeated that they could not as a family. So he called for a supervisor, who defended the employee.
At one point, Morse said his daughter asked if they would be able to get on the plane.
"At that moment I realized my 5-year-old daughter and my twin boys of three years old had experienced discrimination for the first time," Morse said. "That hurts."
They were finally able to board, but Morse said that his spouse and mother had to sit apart from him and the children - his mother in an emergency exit row. He believes that was a dangerous place to seat an elderly woman in case of an emergency.
Southwest Airlines responded to Fox 4's request for their side of the story.
"Our operations agent informed two parents that another member of their group was ineligible to board under family boarding," wrote spokeswoman Brandy King, apparently referring to Morse's mother.
"This conversation had nothing to do with discrimination," King wrote. "We welcomed both parents to board with their children."
Morse said he remembers things much differently, and believes that the gate agent should be fired.
"This isn't customer service," said Morse, who would like to see a letter of apology from the CEO of Southwest Airlines over the incident. "This is discrimination."
Brandy King maintains that no discrimination took place, She pointed out that the airline's family boarding policy is explained on their web site at Southwest.com.
