Darkness At NASA Is Here – But It Won’t Last Forever
Keith’s note: Things are starting to look darker at NASA. The Supreme Court just gave the final, ultimate green light to the Administration to gut agencies – NASA – however they wish to do so. Its time to adapt to this new paradigm. It is gloomy now. But that will eventually pass. NASA’s best days lie ahead. (More below).
According to this CNBC article: “The Supreme Court on Tuesday said it will allow the Trump administration to proceed with large-scale reductions in staff at many federal government agencies as opponents continue to seek to block those efforts in lower-court proceedings.” OK, so that really sucks.
There were not many things standing in the way of the Executive Orders and de facto cancellation plan embodied in the FY 2026 President’s Budget Request for NASA. Add in these new Supreme Court decisions that further limit lower court blocks on Administration actions, and there’s not much left to protect NASA employees from RIFs and layoffs. And of course contractor employees and external researchers who depend on NASA funds have even less protection. So here we are.
If you do not take a buyout by 25 July you are throwing your dice hoping not to be laid off or reassigned to another part of NASA. And if you survive your teammates will be gone. Again, contractor personnel and researchers are collateral damage. The Administration’s political management is filling out obedient senior ranks at NASA HQ. Center Directors, Associate Administrators, and Program Managers will soon make sudden departures as required loyalty to the new way of running a shrinking NASA asserts itself.
Once the dust settles – and the damage to NASA becomes clear – those of you who survived will be called upon to clean up the mess. I lost a dream job at NASA under similar albeit less brutal chaos – so I totally – viscerally – understand your situation. All of you are among the most gifted, energetic, imaginative, inspired, dedicated creative, and truly cosmic-minded team ever assembled – anywhere.
Wherever you are now – and wherever you end up – you’ll will quickly learn that ‘you may leave NASA – but NASA never leaves you’. Someday, after this nightmare passes, you’ll all show those who sought to ruin NASA just what NASA people can really do. There’s a vast universe to explore. NASA people have – and always will – lead the way.
Ad Astra to all of you.
Keith
14 responses to “Darkness At NASA Is Here – But It Won’t Last Forever”
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Needed this.
I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to forgive friends and co-workers who knowingly, for whatever reason, voted for this.
They told you what they were going to do. Fears were dismissed.
Whether they voted out of fear, bad information, or sadly, out of their own selfishness and hatred of the other….I will remember this.
Thanks for all you do Keith; it’s been a hell of a day, in a hell of a week, which is turning out to be a hell of year. And we’re only halfway through each of those. I am glad someone is seeing and writing about what’s happening at NASA so it doesn’t get lost in the onslaught.
For America this tragedy WILL last generations. The damage that is already done will not be undone. We are not only losing a generation of expertise, we are losing the generation they would train. For America this vandalism is permanent. For other countries it is a boon. I plan to go overseas, as do many of my colleagues. This administration may have hoped to create a glut of engineers for Musk and Bezos to scoop up for pennies on the dollar, but it will mainly lead to a brain drain. Our worst adversaries could never have hoped to do more damage to our nation than this administration has done.
The Supreme Court decision is not a blanket grant. From SCOTUSBlog:
“The Supreme Court was not, the majority emphasized, weighing in on whether any particular RIF approved under the executive order and memorandum was itself legal. “Those plans,” the majority wrote, “are not before this Court.”
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a one-paragraph opinion in which she agreed with the decision to grant the government’s request. She stressed that the executive order instructs agencies “to plan reorganizations and reductions in force ‘consistent with applicable law’” and the OMB/OPM memorandum. Because the court is not considering the legality of those plans, “and we thus have no occasion to consider whether they can and will be carried out consistent with the constraints of law,” she agreed with the decision to grant relief now and allow the district court “to consider those questions in the first instance.””
The key is that the memo said the RIFs have to comply with the law.
That said, the cuts at NASA are not wise.
>‘you may leave NASA – but NASA never leaves you’
I’m not sure this is valid these days, if having to leave under duress, it would be like a divorce. Need to put NASA in the past and move on.
When trump leaves office, the darkness will lift everywhere.
I was laid off/retired from JPL early this year after a glorious 42 year career. I oversaw the design development and deployment of around a dozen science instruments throughout the solar system, collaborating with the fantastic space agencies throughout europe.
It was clear my skills were no longer needed as there will be no planetary exploration missions for at least 5-10 years after the current destruction of NASA and JPL. Whats worse is that the destruction of NASA, one of the most public demonstrations of an America that was great, pales in comparison to the destruction of the rest of our government and democracy.
We have a long way to go to recover from this new Dark Age this administration has descended upon us. The laurels of space science now rest on our European (and yes, Chinese) colleagues who will hopefully carry on while America struggles to overcome and rebuild. Many of NASA’s finest are already moving overseas to continue their work.
I hope we will rebuild and ignite a new Golden Age of planetary science as I was so fortunate to be a part of. As JFK said: “ We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.”
Imagine if our current president even tried to say these words.
https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-speeches/rice-university-19620912
Thanks for helping us explore the universe!
Thank you Keith. I really appreciate what you do!
Thank you for posting the link to JFK’s speech. I never read the entire speech and am amazed how profoundly he described a roadmap that made America great in space by being proud of the nation’s scientific and technological capabilities that were directed to peace through knowledge.
We are now in a dark alternate universe and I expect to see a bearded Spock any day soon.