By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy warned on Thursday that the government could dismiss air traffic controllers who repeatedly fail to show up for work during the government shutdown, saying a spike in absences is causing significant air disruptions.

“If we have a continual small subset of controllers that don’t show up to work, and they’re the problem children … if we have some on our staff that aren’t dedicated like we need, we’re going to let them go,” Duffy said on Fox Business. “I can’t have people not showing up for work.”

Duffy praised the 90% to 95% of controllers who are showing up daily despite not getting paid.

“It’s a small fraction of people who don’t come to work that can create this massive disruption, and that’s what you’r

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