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Speaker 2: President Trump said he would name a new nominee for
Speaker 2: NASA administrator, just days before billionaire Jared Isaacman, who's a
Speaker 2: current pick and a close ally Elon Musk, was set
Speaker 2: to face planned Senate confirmation vote. He's been a Democratic
Speaker 2: donor in the past, Jarediagman has, and he's found support
Speaker 2: across swaths of the space industry and in Congress, though
Speaker 2: some lawmaker's voice concern over his close ties to Musk's SpaceX.
Speaker 2: We got with us Lauren Grush. He's Bloomberg News space reporter.
Speaker 2: She's also the author of the six The Untold Story
Speaker 2: of America's first women Astrodout. She joins us from Austin, Texas. Lauren,
Speaker 2: we had you on when Isaacman was chosen. This is
Speaker 2: a guy who's actually been to space. He's a billionaire,
Speaker 2: he knows a lot about space. He's a fighter pilot.
Speaker 2: He's the CEO of SHIFT, or was at the time,
Speaker 2: not anymore, the CEO of SHIFT for payments. Just remind us,
Speaker 2: you know, what you spoke to us about just a
Speaker 2: couple months ago when he was named NASA administrator. Just
Speaker 2: remind us who he is and what experience he would
Speaker 2: have brought to NASA.
Speaker 3: Sure, I think when he was first announced there was
Speaker 3: a lot of enthusiasm across the space industry about his
Speaker 3: nomination just because of what you mentioned. He has a
Speaker 3: really long and lengthy resume that comes with, you know,
Speaker 3: in flight space experience. He also has a lot of
Speaker 3: opinions that he voices regularly about space policy on social media.
Speaker 3: He seemed to come to NASA the very clear vision
Speaker 3: of what he thought the agency should be doing, how
Speaker 3: it should be spending its money more efficiently. You know,
Speaker 3: he had a lot of opinions about the inefficiencies of
Speaker 3: the contracting process within the agency, and a lot of
Speaker 3: people celebrated his nomination across the industry just because you know,
Speaker 3: he did such have that you know, very intricate pedigree
Speaker 3: when it came to Space and how to run the agency.
Speaker 2: I do want to correct myself. I said he was
Speaker 2: CEO of shift for, but he was still CEO and
Speaker 2: this is actually part of the story. Taylor Lauber was
Speaker 2: actually set to start a CEO of shift for to
Speaker 2: take over for Isaac Menh. Now that's kind of influx
Speaker 2: emily after this nomination was pulled, Right.
Speaker 4: What was Trump's rationale? What do we know about why
Speaker 4: he holds this nomination?
Speaker 3: Right? Yeah, so the official line concerned. I think what
Speaker 3: Tim said earlier about his past donations to Democrats, what's
Speaker 3: and supposedly that was brought to the President's attention very recently,
Speaker 3: and the fact that you know, he gave more to
Speaker 3: Democrats and to say Republican donors seemed to be rubbing
Speaker 3: the president the wrong way, and ultimately he hinted that
Speaker 3: at that in his social post about why he had
Speaker 3: tould denomination, that he was looking for someone in more
Speaker 3: alignment with the White House. I think what's confusing to
Speaker 3: a lot of people is that it was not a
Speaker 3: secret that Jared had donated to Democrats. In fact, this
Speaker 3: has been widely reported, so perhaps it is something that
Speaker 3: just caught the President's attention recently, or perhaps it's you know,
Speaker 3: the official line for something else, but that that is
Speaker 3: kind of where the White House is pointing to as
Speaker 3: to why this is happening.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting to hear that. I mean, we're not
Speaker 2: going to talk politics here, Lauren, but I just do
Speaker 2: want to remind people that Robert F. Kennedy Junior, for example,
Speaker 2: actually ran against President Trump for the twenty twenty four
Speaker 2: presidency before he dropped out and aligned himself with the President.
Speaker 2: You've had people such as the President himself talked during
Speaker 2: the twenty sixteen election that he was he was asked
Speaker 2: about this, that he had donated to Democrats right in
Speaker 2: the past. And so it's an interesting explanation that we're hearing,
Speaker 2: or a notable explanation that we're certainly hearing from the
Speaker 2: White House. But to me, Lauren, it differs than sort
Speaker 2: of other people that he staffed his cabinet with. It
Speaker 2: hasn't mattered to those folks. I mean, haven't the folks
Speaker 2: like having all these folks like this. A lot of
Speaker 2: the Silicon Valley folks who are supportive of the President
Speaker 2: now weren't supportive of him necessarily in the past right exactly.
Speaker 3: You know, so there is some thought that perhaps this
Speaker 3: is kind of like the straw that broke the camel's back.
Speaker 3: You know, maybe too many people with democratic ties were
Speaker 3: making their way into the administration. But I think it's
Speaker 3: important to think of the el of it all for
Speaker 3: you know, it also comes at a time when Elon
Speaker 3: Musk is very publicly ending, you know, his time at
Speaker 3: h with the White House and his doge operation. And
Speaker 3: Jared Eagan was very much seen as an ally of
Speaker 3: Elon's because he had such close ties to SpaceX. You know,
Speaker 3: He's flown twice with the company to space donated a
Speaker 3: lot of money or invested a lot of money into
Speaker 3: their research programs to further human spaceflight at the company.
Speaker 3: So Jared was very much seen as an Elon Musk ally.
Speaker 3: And so there is obviously a speculation that this was
Speaker 3: kind of related to Elon's exit. Now that he's on
Speaker 3: his way out the door, maybe some pushed for less ties,
Speaker 3: fewer ties to Elon in the White House.
Speaker 4: Hey, Lauren, So you write that the White House is
Speaker 4: about face comes after President Trump released a budget plan
Speaker 4: that would call for slashing NASA's budget by twenty five
Speaker 4: five percent from the previous year. I'm wondering if you
Speaker 4: can talk a little bit more just about like what
Speaker 4: are Trump's visions for NASA right now? What is NASA
Speaker 4: supposed to be doing in an ideal Trump world?
Speaker 3: Right I think that's kind of the open question right
Speaker 3: now among the space community. The budget proposal that the
Speaker 3: White House is released would, if enacted, would be the
Speaker 3: largest single cut to the agency since the agency was created.
Speaker 3: It primarily targets space science programs, so it would cancel
Speaker 3: a lot of missions for planetary science, astrophysics, things of
Speaker 3: that nature. You know, a lot of the things that
Speaker 3: NASA has become famous for are being targeted in this
Speaker 3: budget plan. At the same time, there is a much
Speaker 3: more renewed focus on human spaceflight with the budget, some
Speaker 3: money being given to start, you know, make sure we're
Speaker 3: we stay on the course for lunar exploration. The name
Speaker 3: humans back to the mooned through this, the Artemis program
Speaker 3: that NASA has created, and then also starting up development
Speaker 3: into potentially sitting humans to Mars. So it seems like
Speaker 3: there is much more of a focus on funding human
Speaker 3: spacelight initiatives and a poolback on space science, which doesn't
Speaker 3: necessarily have humans on board when those happen. And I
Speaker 3: think that's a kind of a fundamental tension that the
Speaker 3: agency has grappled with for many decades, and it seems
Speaker 3: to be clear where this White House what line they
Speaker 3: fall on when it comes to that debate.
Speaker 2: We're speaking with Lauren Grush. She's Bloomberg News Space reporter.
Speaker 2: She's also the author of The Six, The Untold Story
Speaker 2: of America's first women astronauts Joining us from Austin, Texas. Lauren,
Speaker 2: do we know what direction the president wants NASA to
Speaker 2: go in? Or the president? We don't? Do you know
Speaker 2: which direction the President will go in? Now that Isaac
Speaker 2: Men's name has been pulled? Are there any names being
Speaker 2: banded about at this point?
Speaker 3: There's definitely names being banded about. I'm not sure I'm
Speaker 3: ready to say them publicly, but there's definitely a speculation
Speaker 3: on who would come next. I think what we can
Speaker 3: expect is that this White House is very keen on
Speaker 3: furthering the privatization of spaceflight and making it so that
Speaker 3: NASA helps to jumpstart the commercial space industry even more
Speaker 3: than it already has. So NASA less being the ones
Speaker 3: to oversee development and to spend all the money on
Speaker 3: all these endeavors, but to partner with the commercial space
Speaker 3: industry and to you know, make help the vitalization or
Speaker 3: revitalization of the commercial space industry by helping companies get
Speaker 3: the money they need to jumpstart their various programs. I
Speaker 3: think the question becomes, though, you know, how long is
Speaker 3: it going to take for a new dominie to get named.
Speaker 3: You know, they have to go through the entire Senate
Speaker 3: confirmation process. Again, we were on the cusp of that
Speaker 3: happening with Jared as I think, as you mentioned, it
Speaker 3: was expected that he was going to get confirmed by
Speaker 3: the full Senate today or at least as early as today,
Speaker 3: and so now we have to start from square one.
Speaker 3: They have to be vetted, they have to go through
Speaker 3: a hearing, and so when that person will be in
Speaker 3: charge of the agency as an open question. And then
Speaker 3: during that time we're going through the typical budget process. Right,
Speaker 3: so there's going to be hearings and discussion among lawmakers
Speaker 3: about these major budget cuts that the White House has proposed.
Speaker 3: But NASA doesn't have a full time advocate, a political advocate.
Speaker 3: They have an acting administrator, Janet Petro, but that person
Speaker 3: has not been fully vetted. It's not her responsibility to
Speaker 3: really take up with the mantle of what the White
Speaker 3: House wants. So NASA is kind of lacking this leader
Speaker 3: to really be an advocate for the agency. And so
Speaker 3: what that means for the budget process through the rest
Speaker 3: of the year is going to be interesting.
Speaker 4: Maybe I am a naive in thinking that space should
Speaker 4: be or supposed to be bipartisan. I'm wondering, You've obviously
Speaker 4: followed the space for a while, is space becoming more politicized?
Speaker 3: I think that is the concern for sure. You know,
Speaker 3: there's for a long time, Space has fairly benefitted for
Speaker 3: space policy has benefitted from being bipartisan. Everybody loves space.
Speaker 3: Democrats and Republicans alike love to, you know, have space
Speaker 3: initiatives in their districts and things like that. I think
Speaker 3: everybody can rally behind space. But I think the concern
Speaker 3: is that, you know, with Elon's foray into politics, you know,
Speaker 3: he's obviously very closely aligned with SpaceX and NASA and
Speaker 3: now space policy, and so, you know, has that had
Speaker 3: a tarnishing effect on space? And you know, people who
Speaker 3: support space. I don't know if we're that far into
Speaker 3: it yet. But that is the concern because once space
Speaker 3: has become politicized and it suffers from many of the
Speaker 3: other things that happened to very politicized topics, you know,
Speaker 3: and then it becomes less about you know, science and
Speaker 3: discovery and more about who supports what.
Speaker 2: Lauren gonna have to leave it there. Always appreciate when
Speaker 2: you joined us, and we know we'll have you back
Speaker 2: on when they announced a new pick for NASA administrator,
Speaker 2: but hopefully before then as well. Lauren Grush Bloomberg News
Speaker 2: Space reporter. Check out her book The Six The untold
Speaker 2: story of America's first women astronauts.