U.S. Congress
Full Text | McCain Blasts Appropriators for Lifting RD-180 Ban
U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) took to the Senate floor Dec. 16 to blast the Senate Appropriations Committee for eliminating restrictions Congress imposed last year on the Pentagon's use of Russian-built RD-180 rocket engines.
Congress Defends Commercial Space Bill’s Resource Rights Provisions
With the biggest commercial space bill in more than a decade now signed into law, members of Congress and their staffs are now turning their attention to reports required by the new law as well as other legislation.
GOES-13 Instrument Failure Punctuates Lawmakers’ Concerns About NOAA Transparency
House lawmakers scolded NOAA’s top satellite official here during a Dec. 10 hearing about a lack of transparency in the civilian agency’s major geostationary weather satellite program, which recently fell six months behind schedule on launching its next spacecraft.
Commercial Launch Sector Gets What It Needs
The U.S. Space Launch Competitiveness Act, which was signed into law by President Obama Nov. 25, is a victory for one industry sector that only recently returned to U.S. territory and another, fledgling sector that finally appears on the verge of becoming a reality.
New Law Unlikely To Settle Debate on Space Resource Rights
Language in a new commercial space law that grants companies rights to resources they extract from asteroids and other solar system bodies provides them with some certainty, but they acknowledge that the law is likely not the last word on the issue.
McCain Urges Appropriators To Uphold RD-180 Ban
U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has asked the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), to reject the idea of inserting a provision into a must-pass federal spending bill that would give the U.S. military access to a controversial Russian rocket engine until an alternative becomes available.
House Schedules Vote To Override Defense Bill Veto
As expected, President Obama vetoed the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act, putting several national security space-related measures in limbo.
Editorial | New Hope for Ex-Im Bank
With an already dysfunctional U.S. House of Representatives sinking deeper into chaos, a small but gutsy group of Republicans pulled an arcane procedural maneuver to force a vote as soon as Oct. 26 on reauthorization of the U.S. Export-Import Bank.
Commercial Space Supporter McCarthy Drops House Speaker Bid
House Majority Leader and commercial space supporter Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has taken himself out of the running to become the next House speaker.
NASA Updates Government Shutdown Plans
More than 95 percent of NASA’s workforce would be furloughed should the government shut down on Oct. 1, according to an updated agency plan, even as the chance of such a scenario decreases.
Editorial | Open Season on SpaceX
The company's congressional detractors have taken the offensive in the wake of the June 28 failure of its Falcon 9 rocket on a resupply mission to the International Space Station.
NASA Seeks Spending Flexibility To Keep Commercial Crew on Schedule
As NASA continues to advocate for full funding of its commercial crew program in 2016, the agency is seeking flexibility for the program in an upcoming short-term spending bill to avoid the risk of further delays.
Editorial | The Price of Ideology
The space industry is beginning to feel the impact of the U.S. Export-Import Bank's authorization lapse.
Q&A with U.S. Rep. Brian Babin (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Science Space Subcommittee
The rise of Rep. Brian Babin (R-Texas) to the chairmanship of the U.S. House Science space subcommittee was an unusually fast one. The dentist-turned-politician was elected to Congress only in November, but by June had assumed leadership of the space policymaking panel, replacing Rep. Steven Palazzo (R-Miss.), who took a seat on the House Appropriations Committee.
NOAA Digs In on Polar Follow-on Plan Despite Cloudy Funding Outlook
NOAA does not intend to rework its plan for developing and deploying the three polar-orbiting weather satellites Congress is refusing to fund at the level the White House requested for 2016, the agency’s top satellite official said here July 28.
Lawmakers Fret About SpaceX-led Failure Probe
A group of mostly Republican lawmakers, many of whom represent states with a United Launch Alliance presence, want to know how tough NASA and the U.S. Air Force are getting with SpaceX after a June 28 launch failure that destroyed a load of NASA cargo bound for the International Space Station.
