NASA says Trump is liable for stranded astronaut saga ending: ‘It wouldn’t have occurred’
NASA is crediting President Donald Trump for spearheading the mission to bring back its stranded astronauts.
Bethany Stevens, a spokeswoman for the agency, spoke glowingly about the new administration’s role.
‘It would not have happened without President Trump’s intervention,’ she told Fox News Digital, adding that it was a ‘huge win for the Trump administration.’
The extended space mission entered the political spotlight in January, when Trump said he told Elon Musk to ‘go get’ the astronauts who had been ‘virtually abandoned’ by the Biden administration.
Musk echoed this statement, and in February, the two of them doubled down on their claims by blaming the astronauts’ delayed return on ‘political reasons.’
Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore were only supposed to be on the ISS for eight days, but ended up staying for more than nine months due to technical issues with their spacecraft, Boeing’s Starliner.
Williams and Wilmore finally returned to Earth on March 18, splashing down off the coast of Tallahassee, Florida inside the SpaceX Crew-9 Dragon capsule.
Once the two astronauts were on the ground, NASA officials praised the Trump administration for the success and timing of their return.
Williams and Wilmore splashed down off the coast of Tallahassee, Florida inside a the SpaceX Crew-9 Dragon capsule on March 18, marking an end to their significantly extended space mission
Bethany Stevens, a spokeswoman for NASA, told Fox News that the mission that brought the stranded astronauts home was a ‘huge win for the Trump administration’
‘Per President Trump’s direction, NASA and SpaceX worked diligently to pull the schedule a month earlier,’ acting administrator Janet Petro said in a statement.
‘This international crew and our teams on the ground embraced the Trump Administration’s challenge of an updated, and somewhat unique, mission plan, to bring our crew home,’ she added.
In February, Trump gave the directive to accelerate a mission to retrieve the astronauts.
‘They didn’t have the go-ahead with Biden. He was going to leave them in space. I think he was going to leave them in space. … He didn’t want the publicity. Can you believe it?’ he said.
NASA has not directly commented on Trump or Musk’s claims with respect to the Biden administration, but the agency previously denied that politics played any role in their decision-making around the Starliner crew’s return.
During a March 4 press conference, agency officials said safety, budget concerns and the need to make sure the ISS was continuously manned were driving the decision to have Williams and Wilmore return with SpaceX’s Crew-9 mission.
Now that the Starliner crew has returned, the next thing on the docket is ‘to continue implementing President Trump’s ambitious space agenda that he touted in his inaugural address is to confirm his nominee for NASA administrator, Jared Isaacman,’ Stevens told Fox News Digital.
In January President Trump announced that he told White House adviser and SpaceX Chief Executive Elon Musk to ”go get’ the 2 brave astronauts who have been virtually abandoned in space by the Biden Administration’
She highlighted the billionaire entrepreneur’s philanthropy and the fact that he ‘was the very first civilian to do a human spacewalk,’ but noted that both he and Trump are ‘outsiders.’
‘President Trump was also once considered an outsider, and the American people have put him back into office, just showing how much they appreciate the business side that he brings to the table,’ Stevens said.
‘And Mr. Isaacman also has a background as an entrepreneur of an extremely successful business.
‘I believe that he is well-suited, as do 30 astronauts who wrote in support of him and multiple GOP governors, that he is well suited to take the helm here at NASA and to implement the president’s agenda.’
On Friday, former astronaut Garrett Reisman posted a letter endorsing Isaacman on the social media site Bluesky. It had been signed by himself and 27 other former astronauts.
He faces an upcoming Senate confirmation hearing, though the date of the hearing has not been set yet.
In their letter, the group of former astronauts who endorsed Isaacman urged the Senate Commerce Committee to hold his confirmation hearing ‘as soon as practical.’
Earlier this month, Isaacman has also gained support from eight Republican governors: Florida‘s Ron DeSantis, Arkansas’ Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Texas’ Greg Abbott, Tennessee’s Bill Lee, Georgia’s Brian Kemp, Missouri’s Mike Kehoe and Oklahoma’s Kevin Stitt.
Williams and Wilmore weighed in on Trump and Musk’s claims in February, saying they did not feel abandoned, stranded or stuck
These governors wrote to the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, to advocate for a ‘swift’ confirmation, noting Isaacman’s ‘unparalleled ability to drive bold initiatives’ and his understanding of ‘the complex landscape of modern space exploration.’
‘I think that these governors are cognizant that the result of the November election was a mandate from the American people to implement change and to bring about change,’ Stevens said.
‘And President Trump has been bringing about that change since day one. The next step here is to confirm Jared Isaacman expeditiously, so that we can get to work on the president’s ambitious space agenda, as he touted in his inaugural address.’
But Isaacman has also received criticism from Republican leaders who complain about his contributions to Democratic candidates and that his companies — Shift4 Payments and Draken International — embrace Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) policies.
Nevertheless, Stevens expressed confidence in the future of NASA under Isaacman’s leadership.
‘We were going to go to the moon and to Mars and beyond, and we have less than four years at this point to get through that considerably ambitious agenda,’ she said.
‘And we need to implement his leadership here at NASA in order to get the ball rolling there. So I think that’s the next step towards being America First in Space.’
