The United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) currently doesn’t have an Administrator. While I know politics is so polarizing nowadays, it’s an extremely important role, since the FAA provides oversight of just about everything in aviation, and that’s something that’s needed more than ever. The FAA reports to the Department of Transportation (DOT), where Sean Duffy is Transportation Secretary.
So there’s some good news. President Trump has just nominated a new person to lead the FAA, though he may get pushback from a surprising group…
In this post:
Trump wants Republic Airways CEO Bryan Bedford to lead FAA
On Monday, March 17, 2025, Trump announced that he has nominated Bryan Bedford to lead the FAA. Bedford is an experienced industry executive, with over 30 years of experience. In a social media post, Trump wrote the following (yes, he switches between Brian and Bryan, that’s not a typo on my part):
I am pleased to announce the nomination of Bryan Bedford to serve as Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). As the former President and CEO of Republic Airways, Mesaba Airlines, and Business Express Airlines, Brian brings over three decades of experience in Aviation and Executive Leadership to this critical position. Bryan will work with our GREAT Secretary of Transportation, Sean Duffy, to strongly reform the Agency, safeguard our exports, and ensure the safety of nearly one billion annual passenger movements. Congratulations Bryan!
I’m a little confused by the reference to safeguarding exports, since that doesn’t seem like one of the FAA’s primary functions… what am I missing?
Anyway, I can’t say I’m particularly familiar with Bedford, though he seems like a good pick to lead the FAA. He has a lot of valuable experience in the industry, particularly with regional airlines, and I think that’s useful. He has been CEO at Republic Airways for over 25 years, since 1999, so that’s quite a tenure. For those not familiar, Republic is a regional airline, which operates flights on behalf of the “big three” US carriers.
In the past, we’ve sometimes seen pilots nominated to lead the FAA, and I think it’s cool to see an airline CEO selected to lead the agency, who has a good understanding of the way that airlines interact with regulators.
While not of any consequence, in 2010, Bedford was CEO of Frontier Airlines (when Republic purchased Frontier in bankruptcy), and appeared on Undercover Boss, so that’s kind of cool.
Bedford is opposed to the 1,500-hour rule for pilots
Broadly speaking, the industry has been supportive of Bedford’s nomination, including among airline executives and other industry figures. There’s one group that might not be onboard, though. As reported by The Air Current, the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) has “concerns” about Bedford’s nomination.
Why? Well, Bedford has been a vocal advocate for eliminating the 1,500-hour rule for pilots. Republic, under the leadership of Bedford, had been pushing hard for the 1,500-hour rule to be eliminated. Bedford had insisted that “despite the rhetoric to the contrary,” eliminating the 1,500-hour rule would “enhance safety.”
For those not familiar with all of this, the US has the 1,500-hour rule for becoming an airline pilot, whereby pilots need at least 1,500 flight hours in order to get their Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) certificate, required to land a job at an airline.
This is the highest requirement of anywhere in the world, as most other countries will let pilots fly airliners with just a couple of hundred hours experience. However, arguably the US takes this requirement to the extreme.
First it’s worth considering the origin of this rule. In 2013, the requirement for new airline pilots was increased from 250 hours to 1,500 hours, which is a massive change. This was done following the 2009 crash of Colgan Air flight 3407, which crashed primarily due to pilot error.
The catch is that both the captain and first officer on that flight had over 1,500 hours, so that wouldn’t have even been a factor there. While I can appreciate the logic of wanting to make requirements to become a pilot more stringent (250 hours was arguably too low), I’m not sure what exactly this was intended to address.
On the surface, the desire to find avenues that allow pilots into the airline cockpit with fewer hours makes sense to me:
- Lots of hours as such doesn’t make someone a good pilot, but rather it comes down to the training that they receive; in other words, someone spending 1,000 hours on a Cessna giving people first time flight lessons isn’t necessarily going to make them a better airline pilot
- There’s value to having dedicated flight academies where pilots train specifically for becoming airline pilots, as they’ll ultimately have more relevant experience than someone who just has 1,500 hours total
- Becoming a pilot is expensive, and that excludes a lot of people who may potentially be interested in this as a career path; if becoming a pilot can be made more affordable without compromising safety, I’d consider that to be a great thing
Not surprisingly, unions representing airline pilots are huge fans of the 1,500-hour rule, and oppose any efforts to lower that requirement. After all, pilots have been able to negotiate incredible pay increases, and that has largely been thanks to limiting the pilot pipeline by keeping requirements so high.
So if Bedford were confirmed to lead the FAA, I have to imagine that he’d push for the 1,500-hour rule to be abolished.
Bottom line
President Trump has nominated Bryan Bedford to lead the FAA. Honestly, this seems like one of Trump’s better appointments, in terms of picking someone who has a lot of experience in the industry they’d regulate. Bedford has been in the airline business for a long time, and is particularly knowledgable about the inner workings of regional carriers.
However, pilots may be opposed to Bedford, since he wants to get rid of the 1,500-hour rule. Well, or at least he did when he was CEO of an airline.
What do you make of Bedford’s nomination to lead the FAA?
If we can get rid of the 1500-hour rule and change to something that other countries have... perhaps it's time for TSA to look at how other countries don't require removing shoes.
"pilots may be opposed" - you meant union, not pilots, right?
who makes up the unions?
Why so little experience is needed?
2 years of work experience (that's how long it takes to get to 1,500 hours) before someone new to the profession can start hauling around 200 passengers on a scheduled airline seems too little, not too much.
I don't want a 20 year old with a month's worth of flying up in the cockpit of my flight.
@ Mary -- But two years work experience doing what? Flying a Cessna 152? No one is suggesting that a 20-year-old with a month's worth of flying be hauling passengers...
You always talk about the 1500hr rule without mentioning that it is reducible depending on the type of training one has. For example if you are coming from the military it’s 750hrs. If you are trained at an accredited university it’s 1000hrs. If you are trained at an accredited flight school it’s 1200hrs. Most people go through one of these three paths to become an airline pilot.
@Alex, if that's true it's a really important point. It means that *relevant* experience - what Ben wants to matter more rather than simple hours of experience - already reduces the hours-of-experience requirement. So what exactly does the new FAA director want to do?
@ snic -- See this post for what the proposal from Republic was:
https://onemileatatime.com/news/1500-hour-rule-pilots/
The idea is that military pilots get a shortcut and only need 750 hours, and Republic wanted to be able to create a flight training academy where pilots could be trained with a similar requirement. That seems fair enough to me.
Yet we have 18 year olds with far less experience driving busses around, which have a much higher rate of fatal incidents compared to planes.
500 hours, frozen atpl, pilots flying commercially everywhere in Europe. They are doing fine
We’ve had two recent accidents with Delta feeders that were directly related to inexperienced pilots. Dropping the 1,500 hour rule would be a mistake increasing the risk of more of these.
@ Anthony -- That's just an oversimplification of what's going on, and what kind of experience matters. Consider the following two potential pilots:
-- Someone who has 1,500 hours, with 1,200 of those hours being in a Cessna 152 as a flight instructor
-- Someone who has 750 hours, all of which were obtained through a flight school providing specialized training for working toward becoming an airline pilot
Can you tell me with...
@ Anthony -- That's just an oversimplification of what's going on, and what kind of experience matters. Consider the following two potential pilots:
-- Someone who has 1,500 hours, with 1,200 of those hours being in a Cessna 152 as a flight instructor
-- Someone who has 750 hours, all of which were obtained through a flight school providing specialized training for working toward becoming an airline pilot
Can you tell me with certainty that you think the former is more qualified than the latter? Can you point to any issues with aviation safety in Germany, where pilots can get to the flight deck of an airliner with fewer hours?
Decent pick.
On average, a 1500 hour pilot has a lower incident rate than a 500 hour pilot, but focused training programs provide better safety than hours alone.
"the reference to safeguarding exports"
I can't believe Ben would be this naive.
The mafia bully regulator aka. FAA. Who are among the last in the world to ground the 737MAX.
So there is reason number 1 on safeguarding exports. Never ground Boeing again, NGBA!?!
Reason number 2, weaponizing the IASA audit. The unchecked power to punish countries into Category 2. That means US carriers can launch new services, but local carriers can't.
I can tell just from the picture that he's a good pick, and if Trump likes him, I have every confidence that he'll prevent any external attempts to tarnish America's reputation any further.
LOL!
I'm assuming that remark was sarcastic, otherwise I'll get even more disillusioned with this country right now !
Surprised Elon’s bitch didn’t pick the CEO of Aeroflot
Not to get political but at least this pick has experience in the field of work unlike a lot of Trump’s cabinet picks. Like what does Linda McMahon know about education? Oh yeah…nothing.
Only sycophantic boot licking & $$$ payola is required for this administration's positions ...
What are the hour requirements for the rest of the world? And are there any statistics showing correlation between hour requirements and accidents?
I’m by all means not an expert, and I don’t know what the hour requirements in Europe are, but we do fine with less than 1500 hrs apparently
@ E39 -- It's way lower than basically everywhere else, and given that fatal aviation disasters almost never happen, I think it's safe to say the system is functioning. For example, I believe in Germany the requirement is 250 hours, and we haven't seen an accidental commercial plane crash in Germany in... a very long time.
Germany has basically one airline, Lufthansa and its various subsidiaries/marketing labels, who has its own strict seniority rules.
The US has Spirit and Frontier and little podonk airlines who would have no problem hiring the first 20 year old who shows up with zero work experience as a pilot to save costs.
The only reason why the US historically did not have a minimum work requirement for pilots while they have it for doctors and...
Germany has basically one airline, Lufthansa and its various subsidiaries/marketing labels, who has its own strict seniority rules.
The US has Spirit and Frontier and little podonk airlines who would have no problem hiring the first 20 year old who shows up with zero work experience as a pilot to save costs.
The only reason why the US historically did not have a minimum work requirement for pilots while they have it for doctors and other professions to work alone is that the industry only hired highly experienced pilots from the military. This is no longer the case, due to lower supply of military pilots and higher demand by commercial airlines
Not a nuanced conversation. Type and currency of flying is much more important than total hours. A 2 year pilot with 200 hrs of imc and 500 total time is more current than a 5 year pilot with 100 imc and 1500 total time imho. While schools are important IMC, night and number of landings is much more important than total time. I would take a 400hr pilot with 100hrs of real imc over an...
Not a nuanced conversation. Type and currency of flying is much more important than total hours. A 2 year pilot with 200 hrs of imc and 500 total time is more current than a 5 year pilot with 100 imc and 1500 total time imho. While schools are important IMC, night and number of landings is much more important than total time. I would take a 400hr pilot with 100hrs of real imc over an instructer with 10 and 1500. Can the pilot make a standard rate turn while experiencing vertigo, execute emergency protocols efficiently etc... is more important to me than total time.