New England Patriots' charter plane flew to Guantanamo Bay

A charter company flew one of the New England Patriots' team planes to and from the U.S. naval base and detention center at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba on Monday, according to public flight tracking data.

A plane bearing the team plane's call sign and tail number took off from Fort Worth, Texas, and landed in Guantánamo at 10:49 a.m. central time Monday morning, according to data from FlightAware and ADS-B Exchange. The plane left a few hours later for Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso.

A spokesperson for the Patriots said the team's plane was not used for "any kind of deportation flight," and that "there were no detainees on the plane."

The Trump administration has used the Navy base at Guantánamo in recent months to hold migrants slated for deportation, despite questions of whether the practice is legal.

The Patriots have two Boeing 767s, which are operated by Omni Air International, a charter company. The team's billionaire owner, Robert Kraft, has used the blue-and-red painted planes in the past for high-profile humanitarian missions, like transporting 1.2 million N95 masks to Boston from China at the height of the coronavirus pandemic.

The exact contract arrangement between Omni Air and the Kraft Group is not public.

Asked about the Guantánamo flights, the Kraft Sports and Entertainment spokesperson, Anisha Chakrabarti, said Omni Air "uses the Patriots planes as part of their inventory when chartering to the Department of Defense to move military personnel." Chakrabarti also said, "The New England Patriots organization is not involved in, nor does it approve, sanction, or coordinate the uses of the aircrafts when they are chartered for non-team purposes."

Human rights advocates criticized the Patriots for sharing their planes with the military.

"I think it's reasonable to be very concerned," said Angelina Godoy, director of the Center for Human Rights at the University of Washington. "We know that Guantánamo Bay is being used as we speak as an offsite, extra-judicial detention facility for migrants."

Godoy said a Patriots' plane has been used for deportation flights before, in 2022 when Joe Biden was president. A report from the center she runs found a Patriots charter plane was used three times for deportation flights to Honduras, as part of a wider look at how ICE charters planes used by sports teams, musicians and celebrities.

The Patriots say they no longer contract with their old charter provider and neither of their planes has been used for a deportation flight with the current charter manager, according to a Patriots spokesperson.

Public flight tracking data show the Patriots' planes have bounced between multiple U.S. military installations in recent months, including another February trip to Guantánamo as well as flights to Naval Base Coronado in California and Fort Campbell, an Army installation on the Kentucky-Tennessee border.

Omni, the Patriots' charter company, "flies a lot for the Department of Defense, and a lot of times they're flying troops all around the world," said Thomas Cartwright, an independent aviation researcher who tracks ICE deportation flights.

"It is unusual to me that the Patriots don't change their color scheme when they lease their planes out," he said.

Josh Kraft, a son of Robert Kraft and a candidate for mayor of Boston, declined to comment.

Godoy of the University of Washington said team assets shouldn't be used to shuttle military personnel to and from Guantánamo. "It's not ethical, period," she said. "It's a way for the Patriots in this case, when they're not using their plane, to make an extra buck."

A Patriots spokesperson said the military flights result in "no financial gain to the organization."