Head of the Federal Aviation Administration to resign, allowing Trump to pick his successor

The head of the Federal Aviation Administration, who has led a tougher enforcement policy against Boeing since a panel blew off a jetliner in January, said Thursday that he will step down next month, clearing the way for President-elect Donald Trump to name his selection to navigator the agency.

Mike Whitaker announced his pending resignation in a communication to employees of the FAA, which regulates airlines and aircraft manufacturers and manages the country’s airspace. He became the agency’s administrator in October 2023.

Since then, the challenges confronting Whitaker have included a surge in close calls between planes, a require for stricter oversight of Boeing. antiquated equipment and a shortage of air traffic controllers at a period of high customer demand for air trip.

“The United States is the safest and most complicated airspace in the globe, and that is because of your commitment to the safety of the flying community,” Whitaker said in the communication to employees. “This has been the best and most challenging job of my career, and I wanted you to listen directly from me that my tenure will arrive to a close on January 20, 2025.”

Whitaker took the helm of the FAA after the Senate, which is frequently divided along partisan lines, voted 98-0 last year to confirm his selection by President Joe Biden. The agency had been without a Senate-confirmed chief for nearly 19 months, and a previous Biden nominee withdrew in the face of Republican opposition.

FAA administrators — who hold a job that has long been seen as nonpartisan — generally serve for five years, but that has not happened recently. Whitaker’s predecessor, Stephen Dickson, also stepped down early before fulfilling his term.

Whitaker served as deputy FAA administrator during the Obama administration, and later as an executive for an air taxi corporation.

Less than three months into his tenure leading the FAA, a Boeing 737 Max lost a door-plug panel during an Alaska Airlines flight over Oregon, renewing safety concerns about the plane and the corporation. Whitaker grounded similar models and required Boeing to submit a schedule for improving manufacturing standard and safety.

Whitaker said the FAA’s oversight of Boeing had been “too hands-off — too concentrated on paperwork audits and not concentrated enough on inspections.”

In August, the FAA said it had doubled its enforcement cases against Boeing since the January door-plug blowout.

Senators from both parties praised Whitaker on Thursday before a hearing on the FAA’s air traffic control structure, which has been plagued by a shortage of controllers and ancient equipment. A computer structure that offers safety information to pilots failed in January 2023, causing more than 1,300 flight cancellations and thousands of delays in a single day.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who led the opposition to Biden’s first pick to navigator FAA, said the unanimous confirmation vote for Whitaker was a “testament to his encounter, his judgement and his apolitical nature. He has ably led the agency during a challenging period.”

Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., who heads the Senate aviation subcommittee, said Whitaker’s oversight of Boeing has been essential. “Our aviation structure is safer because of his service,” she said.

Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, which will consider Trump’s nominee to replace Whitaker, said the successor “needs to be ready on day one to continue the job of restoring the FAA’s safety population and providing real oversight of the aviation sector.”

One factor that may affect Trump’s selection is input from Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who has been at odds with the FAA for slowing the Starship mega rocket developed by the billionaire’s SpaceX corporation. Musk, who Trump has named to navigator a recent “Department of Government Efficiency,” or DOGE, has accused the FAA of being overly bureaucratic.