Federal Aviation Administration Administrator Mike Whitaker will be resigning as the head of the agency on President-elect Donald Trump‘s Inauguration Day rather than serve the rest of his term.
Whitaker made the announcement Thursday in a letter to his workforce, describing the role as an “honor of a lifetime,” according to Politico.
“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. “This has been the best and most challenging job of my career.”
Whitaker was unanimously confirmed by the Senate to take over as the head of the FAA in October 2023 when the agency was overwhelmed with challenges and near-collisions due to its depleted air traffic controller labor force.
FAA administrators are sworn in for five-year terms. Whitaker is joining FBI Director Christopher Wray as yet another employee who has volunteered to step down early.
The most recent FAA administrator was Trump-appointee Steve Dickson, who resigned from the FAA just over two years into his term in March 2022. The FAA then went through more than a year and a half without leadership, forcing Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to take on the responsibility of running the outfit.
Despite House and Senate lawmakers on both sides of the aisle attributing the rise in aviation safety to Whitaker, Republicans pressed him during a September House Transportation Committee hearing about the FAA’s “undue scrutiny” towards Elon Musk‘s SpaceX.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
The FAA fined SpaceX $633,000 for violating license terms on two 2023 Falcon launches in Cape Canaveral, Florida, and Whitaker claimed SpaceX made the launches “without a permit.” SpaceX posted a statement to X in response, writing that “every statement” Whitaker made about the company during the September hearing was “incorrect.”
“I think safety is in the public interest, and that’s our primary focus,” Whitaker said in the September hearing, defending the fines for the Falcon launches. “It’s the only tool we have to get compliance on safety matters.”