Trump Taps Billionaire SpaceX Astronaut to Run NASA

  • Jared Isaacman has helped to fund SpaceX human spaceflights
  • Musk’s Starlink service is customer of Isaacman’s Shift4 firm
Jared IsaacmanPhotographer: Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images
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President-elect Donald Trump will nominate financial technology billionaire Jared Isaacman, a longtime SpaceX astronaut, to serve as the next NASA administrator.

If confirmed, Isaacman would oversee a US agency with a roughly $24.8 billion budget and a suite of human and robotic space exploration programs, including the flagship Artemis moon mission. He would replace Bill Nelson, a former US senator from Florida, who has run the agency under outgoing President Joe Biden.