Trump nominates billionaire Jared Isaacman for NASA chief — again

a smiling man shakes hands with a young person on a runway with military jets in the background

Jared Isaacman meets with a St. Jude Family at the Sun 'n' Fun Aerospace Expo in April 2024. (Image credit: Polaris Program / John Kraus)

Jared Isaacman is in line to be NASA chief — again.

President Donald Trump just tapped the billionaire tech entrepreneur to lead the U.S. space agency, five months after pulling his nomination for the same post.

a man in a spacesuit leans out of a space capsule, with earth in the background — Polaris Dawn commander Jared Isaacman becomes the first private astronaut to perform a spacewalk on Sept. 12, 2024. (Image credit: SpaceX)

That astronaut experience is extensive. Jared Isaacman, who founded the payments company Shift4, has organized, funded and commanded two private astronaut missions to Earth orbit, both of them using SpaceX hardware. On the second of those flights, called Polaris Dawn, he conducted the first-ever private spacewalk.

This will be Isaacman's second trip down nomination lane. Trump put him up for NASA chief this past January, and Isaacman looked set to be confirmed by Congress — until the president abruptly pulled his nomination on May 31, citing Isaacman's past donations to Democratic political candidates and supposedly close relationship with SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk.

Isaacman apparently isn't holding a grudge; he said he's ready to go through the process all over again.

"Thank you, Mr. President @POTUS, for this opportunity. It will be an honor to serve my country under your leadership," Isaacman said in a post on X, the social media platform that Musk owns, on Tuesday evening.

"The support from the space-loving community has been overwhelming. I am not sure how I earned the trust of so many, but I will do everything I can to live up to those expectations," he added.

NASA is currently led, in an acting capacity, by Sean Duffy, the former timber-sports champion and reality TV star who also serves as the Secretary of Transportation.

Duffy had been angling to hold on to the NASA job, according to media reports. But he struck a conciliatory and congratulatory tone in his own X post on Tuesday.

"Thank you @realDonaldTrump for the honor to lead @NASA. We’ve made giant leaps in our mission to return to the moon before China. It’s critical for our national security and national pride that we win the next space race. Congratulations to @rookisaacman. I wish him all the success and will ensure the transition is seamless," Duffy wrote.

Isaacman seems to enjoy widespread support from the space community, but his ascension to NASA chief is not a fait accompli — he still has to go through the confirmation process, which didn't end well last time. That confirmation process will likely be on hold due to the ongoing government shutdown, which has been underway since Oct. 1.

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Michael Wall is a Senior Space Writer with Space.com and joined the team in 2010. He primarily covers exoplanets, spaceflight and military space, but has been known to dabble in the space art beat. His book about the search for alien life, "Out There," was published on Nov. 13, 2018. Before becoming a science writer, Michael worked as a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. in evolutionary biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, a bachelor's degree from the University of Arizona, and a graduate certificate in science writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find out what his latest project is, you can follow Michael on Twitter.

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