President Donald Trump deputized tech billionaire and SpaceX owner Elon Musk to bring back two astronauts stranded on the International Space Station since June 2024.
Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams have been stuck in space after their originally scheduled eight-day mission ended up with a malfunction in the Boeing Starliner during takeoff, forcing the spacecraft to return without the pair. NASA claimed their return was too risky.
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“I have asked Elon. I said, do me a favor. Can you get them out? He said, yes he is preparing to go up I think in two weeks,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office Thursday afternoon.
The NASA astronauts will get a ride on SpaceX after their replacements arrive next week at the International Space Station.
The president had a kind message for Wilmore and Williams and noted the latter’s “wild” hair.
“We love you and we’re coming up to get you,” Trump said before attacking his predecessor, former President Joe Biden. “And you shouldn’t have been up there so long.”
Trump cracked a joke about hoping the two astronauts get along after nine months in space together before reflecting on the seriousness of the problems.
“I hope they like each other,” Trump said, prompting laughter from the room. “And I see the woman with the wild hair, good, solid set of hair she’s got. There’s no kidding, there’s no games with her hair.”
“There’s a danger up there too. They can have some failures up there. That would be very bad,” Trump continued. You gotta get them out.”
Williams and Wilmore are expected to return to Earth later this month, according to NASA.