Report: JSX CEO Alex Wilcox Emerges As Leading Candidate To Head FAA Amid Whitaker Resignation

FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker will resign on January 20, the day of President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration. Whitaker was appointed by President Biden and confirmed in October 2023 for a five-year term.

Aviation watchdog JonNYC reports on word that JSX CEO Alex Wilcox is a finalist to run the FAA.

Alex Wilcox finalist for FAA…supposedly multiple interviews

When asked about this report, a JSX spokesperson offered only that they “have no comment at this time.”


Alex Wilcox, right, in front of a JSX aircraft

Wilcox was a founding executive at JetBlue and President and Chief Operating Officer of oneworld member Kingfisher Airlines. I interviewed Wilcox at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Global Aerospace Summit in September.

At JSX he’s managed to achieve net promoter scores of 75 or above from customers, while going significantly beyond part 135 safety regulations. For instance, in addition to a Safety Management System, JSX has an Aviation Safety Action Program more typical of a large part 121 airline, providing for voluntary, confidential employee reporting of safety-related issues as well as a Flight Operational Quality Assurance program analyzing flight data to identify safety trends and improve operations.

Until a new Administrator is appointed, Assistant Administrator for Finance and Management Mark House is slated to assume the role of acting deputy administrator. Whitaker was preceded by Steve Dickson, who had been Delta Air Lines senior vice president of flight operations prior to his retirement.


Alex Wilcox at JSX Media Day, March 2023

The next FAA Administrator will face challenges involving oversight of Boeing, antiquated air traffic control compounded by staffing challenges, and whether to kowtow to ALPA, American and Southwest in cracking down on smaller part 135 carriers who are necessary for the development of electric aircraft (and therefore ceding competitiveness to China).

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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Comments

  1. Alex is extremely qualified and will do a outstanding job. He is the type of leader who will cut through all the red tape and waste and will improve our whole operations

  2. @Gary, you should add how to better deal with “service” animals on the list of FAA priorities.

  3. Whitaker had a rough term. Boeing safety issues, all the ATC near-misses and staffing issues, the drone situation in NJ at the end of all this. He tried his best, but clearly was dealt a rough hand. But what really seems to be at issue is that his FAA fined Space X, and since Musk is our new president, Whitaker’s gotta go, obviously, out of spite alone. Will the new guy simply abolish the FAA, like every other pick for their respective agency? Who needs safety rules anyway. Let the free market decide who gets to land when. Call me skeptical. Also, for posterity, I must take the opposite side of anything @Tim Dunn says.

  4. Kingfisher was a great airline for me as a consumer, but it went bust!

    JSX is useful to show the industry that there are alternatives to be delivered if the other airlines don’t get their act together, but JSX basically serves just the coastal elites and where such people want to go.

  5. “…JSX basically serves just the coastal elites and where such people want to go.” I looked up where JSX flies and it doesn’t serve most costal areas with only two airports north of Florida and only California airports on the west coast. It does serve airports in Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, though. I think the elites part of the statement is probably true. Basically it looks like it is for the elites of the four largest states by population.

  6. The four most populous states in the US are literally coastal: California, Texas, Florida and New York. They are states with coastal waters, although most of NY’s coast is due to Long Island and is far less extensive than the coasts that California, Florida and Texas have.

  7. Alex would be an outstanding choice. Thought leader and someone who would drive change in the interest of public safety and the consumer.

  8. @GUWonder

    You suggested that JSX primarily serves (wealthy liberals) in NY, CA, etc.; definitionally, these are folks on the ‘blue team,’ yet it’s the ‘red team’ that seems to love JSX’s CEO, who may now become head of the FAA under the new regime in 2025. How ironic. Maybe the culture war is just a distraction from the class war, after all.

    Let’s dive in to culture, anyway. On ‘coastal elites’ —we, the atheist socialists who look down upon ‘flyover country,’ the ‘Heartland,’ and the ‘God-fearing’ people in towns that end with ville—actually, plenty of us who now live in NYC, LA, SF, DC, and Chicago, are originally from ‘red’ states and cities, and do still visit them, for work and family. We don’t choose where we are born, but we do choose where to live. No regrets for us.

    And on coastlines, for NY, it’s not just Long Island; the Great Lakes, Ontario and Erie, make up a lot of the 2,000 miles of coasts in that state.

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