Summary
Elon Musk and his advisers are pressuring Trump to cancel NASA’s $24 billion Space Launch System (SLS), citing high costs and outdated technology.
GOP lawmakers from Alabama and Texas oppose the move due to job losses and national security concerns.
Critics favor SpaceX’s cheaper, reusable Starship, but supporters argue SLS has already flown successfully and is more powerful.
Former NASA administrator Bill Nelson believes SLS will survive, as Trump likely wants to be the president who oversees the next moon landing.
Fuck Musk, but they ain’t wrong. It’s just rearranged space shuttle parts designed to funnel pork barrel money to the same old contractors (except now we even gotta throw away all the RS-25 engines instead of reusing them). There’s nothing fundamentally new there that they didn’t already do in the 60s. It kind of is a step backward in terms of aerospace tech.