When Donald Trump returned to the White House this past January, there was some hope that he might enhance America’s leading role in space exploration or at least do little harm to it. The hopes of that time have been dashed, and NASA now faces a bleak future.
Those hopes were fuelled by memories of the first Trump administration’s space policies, which brought focus to America’s space efforts, including continuing the shift to private sector providers for space transportation services, starting the Artemis program to direct human space exploration toward the Moon, and creating the U.S. Space Force in a time of growing military challenges in space from China and Russia. The policies of that administration were continued almost seamlessly by the administration of Joseph Biden.
Trump took office in January for the second time with boasts of American innovation and exploration, and a promise to have U.S. astronauts "plant the stars and stripes on the planet Mars.” Smiling nearby was Trump’s friend and supporter, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, the personification of the new dynamism in America’s private space sector. In contrast to the many controversial and partisan picks Trump made for other leading positions in his administration, Trump had already selected entrepreneur Jared Isaacman to lead NASA, a business associate of Musk but a popular choice whose appeal crossed political lines.
The new Trump administration quickly imposed unprecedented and arbitrary cutbacks on many parts of the U.S. government, notably those related to science, and fears grew that this treatment would be extended to NASA. In April, Isaacman faced generally friendly questioning from a Senate subcommittee that sent his nomination as NASA administrator to the full Senate on April 30. By then authoritative reports indicated that NASA funding would also be chopped.
Two days later, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released its top line budget proposals for 2026, which called for a 25 percent cut to NASA, including a 50 percent reduction to technology development and 47 percent to science programs. The Artemis program would end after the round-the-Moon mission of Artemis 2 (whose crew includes Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen) and the lunar landing Artemis 3 mission. The Lunar Gateway space station, which includes Canadian participation, would be cancelled. International Space Station operations would be reduced. The Mars Sample Return program and other scientific programs in development, including Earth climate monitoring and robotic planetary exploration, were also put on the chopping block.
On May 30, the administration released its full budget proposal, which confirmed the news contained in the top line budget. Six billion dollars would come off the $24.9 NASA budget from 2025, and more details were released on the curtailment of many smaller scientific programs.
During the month of May, Elon Musk began to withdraw from his controversial government budget cutting activities for the Trump administration, and on May 30, Musk bade farewell to Trump in a media event in the Oval Office. The next day, word leaked out that Trump had withdrawn Isaacman’s nomination for NASA Administrator, and a few days later, Musk and Trump began to feud in social media posts. While the Musk-Trump feud is based on differences over Trump’s federal budget plans, the withdrawal of Isaacman’s nomination also divided the two men. There is still no word on who might be NASA’s next administrator, leaving NASA without leadership probably into 2026.
The U.S. Congress passed Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” on July 3, which restored funding for a few NASA programs related to the Johnson Space Center in the Republican-friendly state of Texas, including Artemis and the Lunar Gateway station and its Canadian Space Agency participation. But it will deepen the U.S. government deficit and cut social programs, which will mean that it will be more difficult to restore cuts made to NASA’s budget this year should political winds change in the future.
The 2026 NASA appropriations process involves further consideration from Congress before the budget year begins in October. Trump’s OMB is working to see that the final budget follows the budget submitted on May 30, complete with its major cuts to NASA, by arranging orders to NASA to prepare to wind down programs facing cancellation in that budget.
According to reporting by Eric Berger, the Senior Space Editor for Ars Technica, the OMB’s budget plans for NASA are driven by OMB director Russell Vought, a self-described Christian nationalist and one of the driving forces of the controversial Project 2025 to restructure the U.S. government. Vought is known to be behind plans to cut science programs across the U.S. government.
Today NASA is facing the loss of a quarter of its budget, which would leave it with the smallest budget it has had since its early days when Dwight D. Eisenhower was president. At present, NASA is being led by an interim administrator who is under orders to toe the line from the White House. This means that Vought and the OMB are calling the shots at NASA unless Congress intervenes before October.
The Planetary Society has stated that the 2026 budget proposal for NASA ends: "41 in-development and active NASA science projects, roughly a third of NASA's entire science portfolio. All Venus missions, including DAVINCI, VERITAS, and the U.S. contribution to ESA's EnVision mission, are cancelled. The Roman Space Telescope — nearly completed — is needlessly delayed with reduced funding, which would only add to the overall cost of the project. Billions of dollars of investments in unique assets and capabilities would be wasted.
"The budget proposes reducing NASA's workforce by nearly 1/3, with nearly 2/3 cuts at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. The lack of projects threatens the financial stability of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. There would simply be no missions for them to work on. The Planetary Society and other organizations have characterized the proposal as an 'extinction-level event' that would usher in a functional dark age for NASA science.”
Despite efforts by some in Congress to preserve high profile but expensive human space programs such as Artemis, many observers believe that these budget plans could imperil NASA’s leadership in that area and many others. On top of the NASA budget cuts, the SpaceX Starship that is at present a key component of Artemis 3 and America’s plans to return to the Moon, is facing delays because of a series of launch and test failures.
Donald Trump is being described as a transformational president, and he may be the most transformational president for America’s space program since John F. Kennedy, whose lunar landing goal made NASA the world’s premier space agency. The cutbacks now planned threaten NASA's leading position in space exploration, at a time when China's space program is closing the gap.
The Canadian Space Agency has recently reaffirmed its association with the European Space Agency, whose scientific programs are not directly threatened by the anti-intellectual predilections of the second Trump administration. This is a wise move, as the Trump cutbacks to NASA will change the direction of space exploration going forward, making Europe a more important player as NASA surrenders its position of leadership.
