In the annals of idiotic government policy, this one has to be somewhere near the top.

Over the last several years, financially-ailing Spirit Airlines has tried to merge with other airlines – most recently with JetBlue. But the legal geniuses in the Biden administration (led by DOJ antitrust chief Jonathan Kanter) sued to block the deal.

On these pages, we highlighted the lamebrained policy several times over the years, and we predicted that the alternative to a merger was almost certain bankruptcy.

So we were not the least bit surprised, but instead infuriated by the headline yesterday morning:

Among the reasons for the Chapter 11 bankruptcy, Spirit management mentioned: “mounting losses, unaffordable debt, increased competition for bargain-seeking airline passengers and the INABILITY TO MERGE WITH OTHER AIRLINES.”

The value of the stock held mostly by American shareholders crashed by more than 60% and is close to worthless now. Thanks, Jonathan.

Taxpayers will get shafted too. The feds handed out more than $20 billion in Biden admin. federal loans to Spirit in 2020 and 2021. Oh, and about 13,000 U.S. airline workers could be losing their jobs in the months to come.

Good thing the DOJ blocked the mergers. Maybe Elon and Vivek will put the hapless antitrust division into liquidation.