Trump meets with Isaacman about top NASA job after pulling nomination
Jared Isaacman, Commander of Polaris Dawn, a special human spaceflight mission, speaks at a press conference at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on August 19, 2024.
Joe Captain | Reuters
President Donald Trump met with Jared Isaacman to discuss another nomination to lead NASA, a source familiar with the talks confirmed to CNBC’s Morgan Brennan.
Isaacman, who has close ties to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, was at the White House for Trump’s dinner for tech power players in September. Musk did not attend.
After a heated battle between Musk and Trump over government spending, the president withdrew his nomination, saying Isaacman was “a blue-blooded Democrat who has never contributed to a Republican before.”
“I also thought it was inappropriate that a very close friend of Elon’s who worked in the Space Business was running NASA when NASA was such a big part of Elon’s corporate life,” Trump said. Real Social Post on June 6th.
Trump appointed Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy as interim head of NASA in July.
Bloomberg He was the first to report on the meetings between Isaacman and Trump.
Isaacman, who declined to comment, was first nominated to head the space agency in December.
Isaacman is an experienced space traveler who led two private space flights with SpaceX in 2021 and 2024. Shift4 invested $27.5 million in SpaceX, according to a 2021 filing.
Isaacman resigns as CEO Shift4He currently serves as chairman of the board of directors of the payment company he founded in 1999, when he was only 16 years old, after his candidacy was withdrawn.
“Even if I knew the outcome, I would do it all over again,” Isaacman wrote of the NASA nomination process. investors Announcing the Shift4 change.
With the tension between Musk and Trump decreasing in the months since then, it now looks like he will do it all over again.
