House lawmakers advanced a spending bill rejecting President Donald Trump’s proposed cuts to NASA, keeping the agency’s budget flat at $24.4 billion.
The White House requested $18.8 billion for NASA, a 23% cut from existing funding levels, while shifting resources away from science and aeronautics programs toward moon and Mars exploration.
The administration said the budget concentrates NASA’s resources on space exploration, arguing ambitious missions rather than education programs would inspire the next generation.
The Republican chairman of the House Science Committee said the White House proposal could not support Trump’s exploration goals.
“I simply do not believe this budget proposal is capable of supporting what President Trump himself has directed the agency to accomplish,” said Rep. Brian Babin, R-Texas, chairman of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee.
Babin said that despite his reputation as a budget hawk, cutting NASA funding was “simply not smart.”
The ranking Democrat on the committee, Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California, called the proposed cuts “draconian” and said the budget was “dead on arrival” in Congress.
The debate comes as NASA and China compete to land astronauts on the moon. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman told lawmakers in April that the race would be decided “in months, not years,” and that China aims to reach the lunar surface before the end of the decade.
The White House budget would cut NASA’s science mission directorate nearly in half, from $7.25 billion to $3.89 billion. It would also eliminate the agency’s STEM education office and reduce aeronautics funding by $325 million, while increasing spending on lunar and Mars exploration to $8.5 billion.
The House bill rejected most of those cuts, keeping NASA’s science programs at $6 billion – still a 17% reduction from last year but well above the White House’s $3.89 billion request – and shifting STEM education funding into a different account rather than eliminating it entirely.
The House Appropriations Committee approved the bill 32-28 along party lines May 13.
NASA is scheduled to hold a news conference Tuesday in Washington on its lunar exploration plans.
In March, Isaacman said NASA would invest about $20 billion over seven years to support a permanent lunar base, while shifting Gateway resources toward lunar surface infrastructure.
The Senate is expected to take up its own NASA spending bill in June, setting up negotiations with the House later this year.