Mike Whitaker, the head of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), who has led a tougher enforcement policy against Boeing since a panel blew off a company jet in January, said on Thursday that he will step down next month, clearing the way for President-elect Donald Trump name his choice to lead the agency.
Whitaker announced his pending resignation in a message to employees of the FAA, which regulates airlines and aircraft manufacturers and manages the nation’s airspace.
He has dealt with challenges including a surge in close calls between planes, a shortage of air traffic controllers and antiquated equipment at a time when air travel and a need for tougher oversight of Boeing.
Whitaker also clashed with Trump ally Elon Musk by proposing that his company SpaceX be fined over safey issues.
“The United States is the safest and most complex airspace in the world, and that is because of your commitment to the safety of the flying public,” Whitaker said in the message to employees.
“This has been the best and most challenging job of my career, and I wanted you to hear directly from me that my tenure will come to a close on January 20 2025.”
Whitaker took the helm of the FAA in October 2023 after the Senate, which is frequently divided along partisan lines, voted 98-0 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 – long seen as a non-partisan job – generally serve for five years.
Whitaker's predecessor, Stephen Dickson, also stepped down before fulfilling his term.
Whitaker had served as deputy FAA administrator during the Obama administration and later as an executive for an air taxi company.
Less than three months after he became administrator, a Boeing 737 Max lost a door-plug panel during an Alaska Airlines flight in January, renewing safety concerns about the plane and the company.
Whitaker grounded similar models and required Boeing to submit a plan for improving manufacturing quality and safety.
In August, the FAA said it had doubled its enforcement cases against Boeing since the door-plug blowout.
Then, in September, the agency clashed with Musk after Whitaker proposed SpaceX be fined $633,009 over safety issues with two of its launches in 2023.
Whitaker told a congressional hearing on the matter: “They’ve been around 20 years, and I think they need to operate at the highest level of safety and that includes adopting (a safety management system) program, that includes having a whistleblower program.”
But Musk hit back, writing to the legislative to complain about the fines, threatening a lawsuit and even calling on the administrator to resign.
