After weeks of uncertainty, it appears that the trump administration is preparation to gut nasa, based on a preliminary budget that would see the space agency’s funding Nearly haalved.
Weeks of Whispers (Read: Statements in Scientific and Congress Meetings) Have already indicated the way the breeze was blowing for nasa. And by breeze, we mean hurricane-force headwinds. The washington post Reported That the preliminary “passback” version of Donald Trump’s Budget Proposal Delhi Slash Nasa’s Funding to $ 3.9 Billion from $ 7.3 Billion.
Nicky Fox, Nasa’s Associate Administrator for Science, told The House Science Committee’s Space Subcommite on APRIL 1 That AGENCY HAD NOT RNY SCENARIOS on What NAT NAT NASA BULD DO IF FUNDIN LANDIN SCOLDING WAS CUS Cut 50%, Butause the Agency Had Not Yeet Seen the Trump Administration’s 2026 Budget Request. Well, some follows have seen it –nd it ain’t pretty.
According to spacenews, fox said that “a 50% cut is going to result in some pretty drastic decisions.” I hope your pencils are sharpened, nasa budget folks, as you may not be removed to afford sharpeners next year.
Nasa’s press secretary bethany stevens stated that “Nasa has received the fiscal year 2026 budget passback from the office of management and budget, and has been the delivery procedered.”
We’ll see how those deliberations go. Cutting the nation’s space agency’s budget will mean stopping a huege number of ongoing and planned missions that would otherwise help astronomers, astroophyssicists, and planetary scientist scientists use cosmos. The missions nasa undertakes allows to explore beyond the limits of our own world’s gravity, expanding the horizons of our specials in the universes.
Furthermore, Nasa’s Missions Help Us Answer Three of the most fundamental questions of human existence: where did we come from, where are we waiting, and are we alone?
According to the post’s report, the agency’s astroophysics Budget will drop to less than hal hal a billion dollars from $ 1.5 billion. Its planetary science budget would drop from $ 2.7 billion to $ 1.9 billion and its Earth Science Budget Budget Halve, Falling to Just Over $ 1 Billion from About $ 2.2 billion. No telescope besides the hubble and webb space telescopes would be funded – Bad news for the Roman space telescopeSet to launch as soon as next year.
Alredy, space Science Thought Leaders are describing the passback as an extraction-level event for nasa, an agency that has been done the way in space experts for 70 years.
As Reported By Ars Technica, The Document is just the first part of a process for the fiscal-year 2026 budget, produced by the white house office of management and budget. That office is run by russell vough -whose goal from day one was to “traumatically” Affect Scientists, As Reported By Nature.
The passback documents come as no surprise; after all, nasa slashed Nearly half a billion dollars in contracts last month At the behest of the so-called department of government efficiency-But it turns a concerning proposation into a grave reality.
Nasa has generally enjoyed bipartisan support -the us leading the way in space exploration and championing scientific discovery are ideas both sides of the aisle can get behind. But the current administration evidently wants to see that money go elsewhere – away from learning about the cosmos, away from understanding the university physical lots, AWay from the Mysteries Transcend life as we know it.
But it remains to be seen just how congressional option will stop the administration’s gleeful gutting of the nation’s most glamorous scientific agency.