Utah’s Senators like Mike Lee and Orrin Hatch along with Delta Air Lines officials have stated that the Persian Gulf nation of Qatar is taking a resource of old tricks that might hurt the US carriers.

It comes after a year of Utah’s politicians from Gov Gary Herbert to Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski demonstrated that Qatar’s financial aid of its national airline had forced Delta and other airline carriers to decrease its services across some routes to the Middle East and India.

Lee along with Hatch, both R-Utah, are among 13 lawmakers who now states Qatar Airways purchased a 49% share of grappling Air Italy and again is trying to use financial aid from the Qatari government to cut down its fares and get rid of competition on some profitable European routes.

Lee and Hatch wrote to Elaine Chao, Transportation Secretary; Wilbur Ross, Commerce Secretary; and Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State requesting them to probe whether Qatar is breaking international accord. They stated that Qatar Airway’s recent procurement of Air Italy raises a healthy apprehension that Qatar is adhering to all duty under the Open Skies Agreement.

Lee even stated that endeavours by foreign governments to either offer financial aid or offer other benefits to the air carriers can lead to serious market deformity and cause pain to American carriers as well as consumers.

Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian also requested for an investigation. He stated that Qatar Airways proclaimed of a major global expansion of flights between Milan and North American cities, which includes New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, and Toronto. He further added that as these Italian routes, is very competitive and well-distributed by present carriers, and is simply not economically feasible without Qatari financial aid. By flooding these markets with sponsored capacity and reducing prices far below costs, Qatar is starting another attack on U.S. airline employees as well as travellers.