President Trump signed an executive order on August 28, 2026, establishing a Presidential Commission on the United States Space Academy, a proposed institution intended to train a pipeline of engineers, operators, and service members for civil, military, and commercial space work, according to the White House’s own text of the order and reporting from NASA, CBS News, and Space.com.
Trump announced the order during an event at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, where he also awarded the Congressional Space Medal of Honor to the four-person crew of Artemis II. The commission will be chaired by the NASA administrator, with the assistants to the president for economic policy and for science and technology serving as vice chairs; other members include the secretaries of defense and of the Air Force.
120-Day Deadline for Recommendations
The order gives the commission 120 days to submit a report recommending a governance framework for the academy, service obligations for graduates, a physical location, and any legislative changes needed to establish it. The initiative reflects growing federal attention to workforce gaps in space-related fields as commercial companies take on work that historically sat inside government agencies, and follows a year of expanded national-security focus on space and satellite infrastructure.
No timeline for the academy’s opening has been set; officials said that will depend on the commission’s recommendations and any subsequent congressional action.
Leave a Reply