Congress
Moon over Mars? Congress is determined to kill Elon Musk’s space dream.
Trump confidant Elon Musk wants NASA to drop its ambitious plans to return to the moon and instead head straight to Mars. Congress is ready to put up a fight.
Republican and Democratic lawmakers, who control NASA’s purse strings, want Americans to return to the lunar surface in 2027 — and they’re not willing to abandon that mission despite Musk’s obsession with skipping the moon for Mars.
The division sets up a potential showdown with Republican policymakers and the influential Trump ally over one of the most consequential space policy decisions this century.
President-elect Donald Trump has, at least for now, stayed out of the fray. His first administration launched NASA’s plans to land on the moon, but he has also pressed the agency on why it can’t go directly to Mars.
“To bypass the moon would be a mistake,” said Texas Rep. Brian Babin, the Republican who leads the House committee focused on space.
But that’s what Musk, a billionaire space entrepreneur, wants to do. The SpaceX founder dreams of a Mars mission that would preserve human life beyond Earth, even if it costs hundreds of billions of dollars and poses extreme risks to those involved. He’s called colonization of the planet “life insurance for life.”
“We’re going straight to Mars,” Musk posted recently, adding that the moon focus was a “distraction.”
The Mars-first strategy, though, would likely find little support on Capitol Hill. Lawmakers want to focus on preserving jobs tied to moon exploration efforts, support a lunar economy and beat China in space. And since they shape NASA’s budget, the policymakers play a powerful role in the agency’s ambitions.
“There would be a lot of congressional resistance,” to any Mars-first plans, said Casey Dreier, chief of space policy at The Planetary Society, a nonprofit focused on space exploration.
The House and Senate Science committees strongly affirmed their support for moon exploration in NASA reauthorization bills last year.
A switch to Mars would impact programs such as the moon-focused Space Launch System, a multibillion-dollar rocket that provides jobs in numerous states. The rocket is a key part of Artemis, NASA’s effort to get back to the moon and eventually establish a lunar space station.
“We have put a lot of time, effort and money into Artemis, and I think we should allow NASA to complete that mission,” said Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), a former astronaut.
Mars brings other technical challenges — such as timing. It’s a three-year round-trip mission, versus three days to the moon. And the physical stress of long-term space flight could also endanger the crew once they land.
The U.S. must go to the moon first, said outgoing NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. “You’ve got to learn to walk before you run.”
Musk has long voiced support for traveling to the red planet. It’s not clear whether his January post referred to NASA’s current efforts or a separate SpaceX-funded mission to Mars. Musk and SpaceX did not respond to requests for comment.
Trump hasn’t publicly chosen a side. He supported a return to the moon in his first term but has since shown increased interest in Mars.
The president-elect castigated NASA’s focus on the moon in a June 2019 tweet. A month later he repeatedly asked then-NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine about the possibility of going to Mars directly. His transition team did not respond to a request for comment.
Mars also could prove a financial loss to lawmakers. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas.) and Babin, for example, have promoted the development of the commercial space industry and could end up deflating business interests in space if they switched NASA’s focus to Mars.
And Congress’ moon advocates worry a shift would cede the lunar surface to China, which plans to land its own astronauts there by 2030.
“If we do not beat the Chinese to the moon, they are going to write the rules of the road up there,” Babin said.
But going against Musk brings its own set of concerns. He’s already threatened to fund primary challenges against Republicans who didn’t back Trump’s cabinet picks, and contesting his space ambitions could prove politically risky.
“Is it more important to be aligned with the leader of your party?” said Dreier, the space expert. “Or is it more important to fight for those technician and engineering jobs that go to your state?”
Joe Gould and Connor O’Brien contributed to this report.
President Donald Trump is touting a deal that would end the monthslong war with Iran — and potentially ease some of the political headwinds bearing down on Republicans.
GOP lawmakers still have lots of questions.
The absence of publicly released text for the “memorandum of understanding” Vice President JD Vance reportedly signed with Iranian officials Sunday left an information vacuum on Capitol Hill, where senators of both parties were left airing concerns about what the deal might entail.
Even most Republicans agreed: More information needs to come to Congress soon, and any agreement touching on the future of the Iranian nuclear program would have to eventually be subject to a congressional vote.
“If you want a deal to last, it can’t be an executive agreement,” said Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.). “We’ve got to have a vote of Congress to be able to solidify [it] long term.”
The bipartisan scrutiny of the long-brewing agreement is a legacy of the last Iran nuclear deal, consummated more than a decade ago by then-President Barack Obama amid a bipartisan uproar over trading sanctions relief and cash concessions to the Iranian regime in return for curbs on its nuclear ambitions.
Trump withdrew from the deal in his first term, and now he is back with an agreement that — pending release of the text and final negotiations yet to come — could end up looking like Obama’s deal. That has raised the hackles of both defense hawks who despised the original agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and Democrats who believe Trump never should have left it in the first place.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), one of those defense hawks, told reporters that he was “pulling for a deal,” while also making note of serious discrepancies in the terms that have emerged thus far.
“The MOU being described by us sounds really very good; the MOU being described by Iran sounds awful,” Graham said.
“If they can enrich [uranium] anywhere at all, then it’s the same as JCPOA. If they can’t enrich, then that makes it a good deal,” he continued, adding in a separate conversation that he was “skeptical that Iran will ever go there” to cease enrichment.
The Trump administration said it expects release of the memorandum of understanding no later than Friday.
The possibility that Congress would take any kind of vote on the agreement is also a legacy of the 2015 deal. Amid bipartisan concern about the Obama administration’s pursuit of nuclear talks, the GOP-controlled House and Senate that year passed legislation allowing for congressional review of any agreement dealing with the Iranian nuclear program.
That law, however, does not require Congress to approve a deal — it rather gives it the ability to kill a deal via a disapproval resolution that could be subject to presidential veto. That means each chamber would have to effectively muster a two-thirds majority to block Trump, something it did not come close to doing in 2015.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday there is “probably some expectation” that his chamber would ultimately vote on the agreement while declining to weigh in on the particulars.
“I just don’t know enough about it yet, and I don’t think even the people who follow this stuff closely up here know that much about it,” he said, adding that he expected Vance or other administration officials to brief members on the deal at some point.
The lack of specificity was par for the course on Capitol Hill Monday, with many senators expressing exasperation that text of the signed agreement has not yet been released.
“If it’s a secret deal, then how can I take it seriously?” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) told reporters.
The agreement reportedly includes reopening the Strait of Hormuz to commercial shipping, but it’s not clear to what degree Iran will be required to abandon its nuclear program. Vance indicated in a series of interviews that the administration will attempt to ensure Iran does not develop or obtain a nuclear weapon but left details regarding civilian nuclear facilities and potential uranium enrichment unaddressed.
The White House circulated talking points to Hill Republicans Monday touting the deal including that “Iran will never have a nuclear weapon” and “energy prices … are coming down,” according to a copy of the document reviewed by Blue Light News. The administration also argued in the memo that the agreement “beats” the Obama-era agreement.
In the absence of further details, senators mainly agreed that they wanted a chance to formally review and vote on the deal — even as some Republicans predicted the administration would find a way to avoid that happening.
“I don’t expect that to happen,” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said about a vote. “They’ll try to write it around the treaty requirements, so I don’t expect we’ll vote on it.”
Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) said the administration should send the deal to Congress “if they want it to be something other than a political agreement, like the JCPOA was.”
Most congressional Republicans have been eager for Trump to find a way out of the nearly four-month war, which has driven up energy prices ahead of the November elections. Thune predicted Monday that a deal would “have a very positive impact on the economic situation in the country and that obviously will translate into the political situation in the country.”
Some of Trump’s most vocal allies on Capitol Hill praised the agreement Monday.
Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) said has had conversations with senior White House officials and he was “very hopeful.” Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), who is likely the next Senate GOP campaign chair, added on X: “President Trump deserves our trust and support as he works to bring peace to the Middle East.”
Democrats were largely keeping their powder dry Monday on how they would handle a vote on the agreement. Some could find it hard to oppose a deal that ends hostilities on negotiated terms roughly similar to what was secured under a Democratic president in 2015.
But plenty of Democrats questioned what was gained by the conflict.
“We still don’t know the details,” Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the Senate floor. “The American people need to know exactly what’s in the deal. … We know this for certain: We are worse off than before Trump began his foolish war of choice.”
Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday he hopes his predecessor as top Republican, Mitch McConnell, returns this week from a hospitalization.
Thune said he had not yet spoken directly with the 84-year-old Kentuckian but is getting “readouts from his staff.”
Asked about McConnell’s condition or if he knew if he would be back this week, Thune told reporters, “I’m hopeful that he’ll be back this week.”
A McConnell spokesperson said Sunday that he had been admitted to the hospital but did not provide details on his condition or why he was hospitalized — a break from recent prior instances where the seven-term senator was hospitalized.
A former McConnell staffer who spoke on the condition of anonymity was told the senator was doing much better Monday without any further details on what put him in the hospital.
Daniel Desrochers contributed to this report.
The Senate could vote as soon as Thursday on Jay Clayton’s nomination to serve as director of national intelligence — a lightning speed pace that will necessitate buy-in from all 100 senators.
Confirming Clayton could help shore up enough votes from Democrats to extend a government surveillance program that expired last Friday over opposition to Trump’s pick for acting director, Bill Pulte.
“He will come out of the committee Thursday, at least hopefully, and then if we get consent, we can move,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said in an interview Monday about Clayton, who Trump only nominated for the job late last week.
Democrats “ought to be happy with Clayton,” said Thune, adding that he’s a “good” and “solid” pick.
Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, floated Sunday to CBS News that Clayton could be confirmed this week if every senator cooperates.
Senate Intelligence will hold a hearing Wednesday on Clayton’s nomination. If every member of the panel agrees, he could then get a committee vote Thursday. Confirming Clayton on the Senate floor hours later would require getting agreement from every senator to speed up the process. Opposition from a single member will punt Clayton’s confirmation to next week.
Confirming Clayton Thursday would, crucially, limit — and potentially circumvent — Pulte from becoming acting director of national intelligence, which Trump has slated to take place Friday, June 19.
The president’s decision to put Pulte in charge after Tulsi Gabbard’s departure at the helm of the Office of National Intelligence sparked bipartisan pushback, with Democrats saying they will withhold support for extending Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act while Pulte is in the acting role. Congress allowed the key government spy authority lapse last Friday without a deal.
Trump threw another curveball into a FISA extension over the weekend when he posted on social media that he was against reauthorizing Section 702 unless a GOP elections bill is attached. That bill, known as the SAVE America Act, does not have the votes to get through Congress.
Thune threw cold water Monday on tying the two issues together.
“Yeah, he’s, as you know, passionate about getting that done and wants to use every opportunity to take a shot at it,” Thune said of Trump and his desire to enact the elections bill.
But, Thune said, “we can’t get FISA done” if the policies are linked.
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