Viral TikTok’s $1.75 billion bid to rescue Spirit Airlines is fighting the wrong adversary

(SeaPRwire) –   On Tuesday, the remnants of Spirit Airlines are being dismantled in bankruptcy court. Aircraft lenders are repossessing its bright yellow planes while major U.S. carriers compete for remaining assets, such as airport gates. However, some loyal fans remain determined to prevent the airline’s demise.

Hunter Peterson, a 22-year-old voice actor known for roles in games like Hyrule Warriors, posted a viral TikTok shortly after Spirit announced it would cease operations on Saturday. In the video, he proposed a collective effort: if just 20% of America’s 250 million adults contributed between $30 and $40 each, the funds could save the ultra-low-cost carrier. The video gained rapid traction, prompting Peterson to launch letsbuyspirit.com by Saturday night. The site quickly crashed under heavy traffic but by Tuesday morning reported $132 million in (nonbinding) pledges from over 156,000 supporters, aiming to raise $1.75 billion total.

The campaign uses a populist tone, stating, “Private equity is already circling the wreckage,” and urges passengers, workers, and communities served by Spirit to reclaim ownership—drawing parallels to the Green Bay Packers, WinCo Foods, and “us.” It claims the minimum donation of $45 mirrors the cost of a one-way Spirit ticket, with every donor receiving one vote and profits distributed proportionally.

However, this narrative misidentifies the real cause of Spirit’s collapse. Private equity firms had no involvement in the airline’s downfall. No buyer—including Frontier, which attempted two mergers; the Trump administration; or any venture capital group—was willing to acquire Spirit at the valuation its creditors required. Spirit’s CEO remarked wryly on Monday that “we just kind of ran out of runway.”

With insufficient cash to fund an organized auction of its aircraft and engines, Spirit has opted instead to allow lenders to reclaim its planes. The company officially informed the bankruptcy court this week that it lacks the resources to proceed with a proper liquidation process.

The models cited by Peterson—the Green Bay Packers and WinCo Foods—are misleading comparisons. The Packers operate as the only publicly owned NFL team, but only because grandfathering rules prevented change after the league banned such structures in 1960. Today, Packers shares carry no financial rights, cannot be traded, and offer only sentimental value. WinCo operates as an ESOP (employee stock ownership plan), where contributions come from the company itself, not individual employees. Neither structure aligns with a decentralized online campaign where strangers pledge small amounts for fractional ownership of a bankrupt airline.

Peterson told Yahoo News he would refrain from speaking with media until consulting his lawyer and declined to comment when approached by .

While the foundation of Peterson’s proposal may be flawed, his campaign taps into a genuine public sentiment. Though widely mocked for its yellow planes, non-reclining seats, and steep baggage fees, Spirit was beloved by many as a champion of affordable air travel. Its presence consistently drove fares down across routes—a phenomenon economists call the “Spirit Effect,” documented by the Department of Transportation as causing double-digit fare reductions when an ultra-low-cost carrier entered a market. As William McGee of the American Economic Liberties Project told NPR, “Without Spirit, everyone will be paying more.”

This underlying concern is what Peterson’s campaign, in its fragmented way, seeks to address. Today, the four largest U.S. airlines control roughly 80% of domestic capacity. Even in its diminished state, Spirit remained the eighth-largest carrier nationally. Its exit marks another step in a long history of industry consolidation—such as Northwest into Delta, US Airways into American, Continental into United, and Virgin America into Alaska—that has reduced consumer choice and driven up prices. Spirit’s own CEO, Dave Davis, acknowledged on CNBC that further consolidation might benefit the lower end of the market.