Either way I advised my cousin to call EXPEDIA and see what is up.

My cousin called EXPEDIA and spoke with an outsourced call center employee who apparently said, "that since he (my cousin) is an American he is free to fly wherever he wants", which did not exactly answer my cousins question.

He pressed the outsourced call center employee who finally put him on-hold, came back and offered him a refund since he was unable to determine if the routing was legal or not and the outsourced employee admitted it looked funny to him too.

Now my cousin needs to find a better (or at least more legal route) between EWR-CLE as currently UA wants over $600 for the route.

Dan