Jet­Blue Air­ways and Spir­it Air­lines are end­ing their pro­posed $3.8 bil­lion merg­er weeks af­ter a fed­er­al judge blocked the deal, say­ing it would hurt con­sumers who de­pend on Spir­it’s low­er fares.

Jet­Blue said Mon­day that even though both com­pa­nies still be­lieve in the deal, they were un­like­ly to meet the clos­ing con­di­tions re­quired in the agree­ment be­fore a Ju­ly 24 dead­line.

Jet­Blue’s new CEO, Joan­na Ger­aghty, called the merg­er “a bold and coura­geous plan in­tend­ed to shake up the in­dus­try sta­tus quo” and speed Jet­Blue’s growth.

“How­ev­er, with the rul­ing from the fed­er­al court and the De­part­ment of Jus­tice’s con­tin­ued op­po­si­tion, the prob­a­bil­i­ty of get­ting the green light to move for­ward with the merg­er any­time soon is ex­treme­ly low,” Ger­aghty said in a memo to em­ploy­ees of New York air­line. She said un­cer­tain­ty over the merg­er’s fate was dis­tract­ing the air­line from its ef­fort to re­turn to prof­itabil­i­ty.

Spir­it CEO Ted Christie said he was dis­ap­point­ed that the air­lines could not com­bine and cre­ate a new chal­lenger to the na­tion’s four biggest air­lines but said he is con­fi­dent that Spir­it — which has been los­ing mon­ey since the pan­dem­ic start­ed — can suc­ceed on its own.

Jet­Blue will pay Spir­it a $69 mil­lion ter­mi­na­tion fee.

The Jus­tice De­part­ment sued to block the merg­er last year, say­ing it would re­duce com­pe­ti­tion and dri­ve up fares, es­pe­cial­ly for trav­ellers who de­pend on low-fare Spir­it.

In Jan­u­ary, a fed­er­al dis­trict judge in Boston sided with the gov­ern­ment and blocked the deal, say­ing it vi­o­lat­ed an­titrust law.

On Mon­day, the Jus­tice De­part­ment took a vic­to­ry lap.

“To­day’s de­ci­sion by Jet­Blue is yet an­oth­er vic­to­ry for the Jus­tice De­part­ment’s work on be­half of Amer­i­can con­sumers,” At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Mer­rick Gar­land said in a state­ment. “The Jus­tice De­part­ment proved in court that a merg­er be­tween Jet­Blue and Spir­it would have caused tens of mil­lions of trav­ellers to face high­er fares and few­er choic­es. We will con­tin­ue to vig­or­ous­ly en­force the na­tion’s an­titrust laws.”

The air­lines had ap­pealed the rul­ing, and a hear­ing had been set for June in the 1st U.S. Cir­cuit Court of Ap­peals in Boston.

The Biden ad­min­is­tra­tion’s Jus­tice De­part­ment, which has fought against con­sol­i­da­tion in sev­er­al in­dus­tries, pre­vi­ous­ly killed a part­ner­ship be­tween Jet­Blue and Amer­i­can Air­lines on flights in New York and Boston.

Spir­it and Fron­tier Air­lines an­nounced a $2.2 bil­lion merg­er in ear­ly 2022 — a deal that would have com­bined two sim­i­lar car­ri­ers that charge low­er fares than the big air­lines but add on fees that gen­er­ate a large chunk of their rev­enue.

Spir­it and Fron­tier Air­lines an­nounced a $2.2 bil­lion merg­er in ear­ly 2022 — a deal that would have com­bined.

Jet­Blue jumped in­to the fray against the wish­es of Spir­it’s man­age­ment, which warned that it would be dif­fi­cult to win reg­u­la­to­ry ap­proval for a Spir­it-Jet­Blue com­bi­na­tion. Jet­Blue went over the heads of Spir­it’s board, di­rect­ly to Spir­it’s share­hold­ers, and won a bid­ding war against ri­val Fron­tier a few months lat­er.

While the deal was tak­ing shape and wound up in court, there were con­tin­u­ing loss­es and oth­er prob­lems at Spir­it, which is based in Mi­ra­mar, Flori­da. In late Jan­u­ary, Jet­Blue warned that it might ter­mi­nate the agree­ment.

Jet­Blue has al­so been los­ing mon­ey and faces its own un­cer­tain fu­ture. Ac­tivist in­vestor Carl Ic­ahn bought near­ly 10% of Jet­Blue stock last month and won two seats on Jet­Blue’s board.

The end of the Jet­Blue-Spir­it deal rais­es ques­tions about whether Alas­ka Air­lines can pull off its pro­posed pur­chase of Hawai­ian Air­lines for $1 bil­lion-plus the as­sump­tion of about $900 mil­lion in debt. The Jus­tice De­part­ment has not in­di­cat­ed whether it will sue to block that agree­ment.

Shares of Spir­it Air­lines Inc. sank 16% in late-morn­ing trad­ing, while shares of Jet­Blue Air­ways Corp. rose slight­ly.

BY MICHELLE CHAP­MAN AND DAVID KOENIG