President Trump and Elon Musk claim the Biden administration abandoned two astronauts in space. But the publicly available evidence suggests a…
On Thursday evening, Eastern time, a SpaceX capsule is scheduled to carry four astronauts to the International Space Station, delayed a day from the Wednesday launch attempt. Their arrival will clear the way for two astronauts that have been labeled as “stranded” to finally return to Earth.
The astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, were supposed to spend about a week on the space station when they went up last June. But they remained on the ISS after the experimental Boeing capsule they took into orbit malfunctioned.
In the past month, President Trump and his close adviser Elon Musk have repeatedly claimed that the decision to leave Williams and Wilmore in space was politically motivated.
“Biden was embarrassed by what happened, and he said ‘Leave them up there,'” Trump said during a press availability in the Oval Office on March 6. “Elon is right now preparing a ship to go up and get them.”
But some former astronauts and NASA officials have denied any political motives behind the extended stay of Williams and Wilmore. Here’s what to know about how they ended up on the station and why they’re finally coming home now.
The SpaceX Dragon capsule heading to the station tonight is carrying the new crew for the station into orbit, but it’s not actually going to be the capsule that brings Williams and Wilmore home.
The capsule the duo will use to return to Earth has been attached to the space station since September of last year. That capsule, also built by SpaceX, arrived carrying NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov, and has two extra seats for Williams and Wilmore.
It could have also returned the astronauts at any point in the past six months or so.
“They had a SpaceX Dragon there as an emergency lifeboat, to bring them back at any time they needed to,” says former NASA astronaut Scott Kelly.
Instead of coming back immediately, Williams and Wilmore were fully integrated into the crew of Expedition 72 aboard the space station. Williams became the station commander in September and both she and Wilmore have worked conducting experiments and spacewalks during their time there.
President Trump appears to have first made the claim that the astronauts were stranded for political reasons on Jan. 28.
“I have just asked Elon Musk and @SpaceX to ‘go get’ the 2 brave astronauts who have been virtually abandoned in space by the Biden Administration,” the president wrote on his social media platform Truth Social.
“Terrible that the Biden administration has left them there so long,” Musk posted the same day on his social media platform X.
The duo has elaborated on that claim several times since. Most notably during an interview with Sean Hannity in February:
“They got left in space,” Trump told Hannity.
“Yes, they were left up there for political reasons, which is not good,” Musk added.
After the interview, things quickly turned ugly on X when a former space station commander, Andreas Mogensen, called that claim “a lie.”
In his response, Musk called Mogenson an “idiot” and said he directly offered to return the astronauts earlier and was rebuffed by the Biden administration.
Former NASA officials have disputed that claim.
“I don’t know who he spoke to,” former NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy told Bloomberg in an interview. “It wasn’t [NASA administrator] Bill [Nelson], it wasn’t me. It wasn’t our senior leadership at headquarters.”
“It certainly did not come to my attention,” Nelson told the Washington Post. “There was no discussion of that whatsoever. Maybe he [Elon Musk] sent a message to some lower-level person.”
Current NASA officials have been less confrontational, but they nevertheless cited multiple technical reasons for keeping Williams and Wilmore at the station.
“Our leadership at NASA was trying to make sure that we considered everything just at a technical level, and that’s what we did,” Ken Bowersox, NASA’s associate administrator for space operations said during a press conference on Friday.
Bowersox and commercial crew program manager Steve Stitch cited cost and safety as the dominant reasons for keeping the two veteran astronauts aloft for longer than planned. Bowersox said that sending up an extra capsule, or returning a capsule early were “ruled out pretty quickly” due to budgetary concerns.
There were also technical issues caused by the decision to return the Boeing capsule Williams and Wilmore originally flew to space without them. When that capsule returned to Earth empty in August, Williams and Wilmore lost their seats—literally.
Stitch says that it was important to have the custom-fitted seats aboard their spacecraft to ensure that the two astronauts were not injured during re-entry and landing. New custom seats were installed on the Dragon capsule that arrived in September, ensuring a smooth return.
“When we laid all that out, the best option was really the one that we are embarking upon now,” Stitch said.
“Every day is interesting because we’re up in space and it’s a lot of fun,” Suni Williams said during a press conference from the ISS on March 4. “The hardest part is having the folks on the ground have to not know exactly when we’re coming back.”
Wilmore added that astronauts are well aware that any trip to space carries risks.
“The mission of the space station… is something that we deeply believe in,” added Wilmore. “It’s that belief that allows us to take those risks.”
Long-duration missions can be psychologically tricky, says former astronaut Scott Kelly, who spent 340 days aboard the space station. But he adds, he has no doubt that Williams and Wilmore have been able to handle it.
“They’re professionals,” says Kelly. “I’m pretty sure they’re not having too much of a problem with this.”
A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
Two NASA astronauts stuck in space since last June are set to come home in a matter of days. Their plight has become political as President Trump and Elon Musk have blamed the Biden administration. But other astronauts and former NASA officials say the Biden White House had nothing to do with it. Joining us now to discuss the return of the astronauts and the politics around it is NPR science correspondent Geoff Brumfiel. So, Geoff, let’s start with what is actually happening today.
GEOFF BRUMFIEL, BYLINE: Later today, a rocket from Elon Musk’s company, SpaceX, is scheduled to carry four astronauts to the International Space Station. A few days after that new crew arrives, three astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut from the previous crew will return to Earth on a different SpaceX capsule. And as you said, two of those astronauts are the, quote-unquote, “stuck” astronauts. Their names are Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams. They launched last June and were supposed to be staying a week. But instead, because of problems with their experimental spacecraft built by Boeing, they’ve had to switch things up, and now they’re coming home probably within a week or so.
MARTÍNEZ: OK. Fingers crossed, I’m assuming, for everyone involved.
BRUMFIEL: (Laughter).
MARTÍNEZ: So what have Elon Musk and President Trump – what have they been saying about why they’re in space?
BRUMFIEL: So Trump and Musk have been repeatedly claiming that Williams and Wilmore could have come down a long time ago, but the Biden White House kept them there. Here they are talking about it during an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity last month.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
ELON MUSK: We are accelerating the return of the astronauts, which was postponed kind of to a ridiculous degree.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They got left in space.
SEAN HANNITY: They’ve been there – they were supposed to be there eight days. They’re there almost 300.
TRUMP: Biden.
MUSK: They were put…
HANNITY: Yeah.
MUSK: Yes. They were left up there for political reasons, which is not good.
BRUMFIEL: And Musk has said on his social media platform, X, that he could have brought home the astronauts sooner. But the astronauts themselves say they don’t really know what the president and Musk are talking about. Here’s Butch Wilmore in an interview from space last week.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
BUTCH WILMORE: We have no information on that, though, whatsoever. What was offered, what was not offered, who it was offered to, how that processes went – that’s information that we simply don’t have.
BRUMFIEL: Now, active astronauts are notoriously careful when it comes to politics, but other former NASA officials and astronauts have said that Musk and Trump are just plain wrong. And it got ugly on social media when a former space station commander said the idea that they were stranded for political reasons was a lie. Musk called that astronaut an idiot and worse on X. And Musk and several astronauts have been fighting on social media ever since.
MARTÍNEZ: Geoff, I mean, this totally sounds like the most 2025 space mission ever. Can you give us any clarity on what actually is going on, please?
BRUMFIEL: Well, I’m obviously not privy to the conversations between NASA and Elon Musk, but I can tell you the following. So fact one – NASA says pretty clearly it left the astronauts up there out of an abundance of caution, not for any political reasons. They weren’t sure their original ride on this Boeing capsule was safe enough to bring them home. Second, once they were up there, they became part of a regular space station crew. So basically, they were integrated into the space station. They’ve been doing normal duties, like experiments and spacewalks, and Suni Williams has actually been commanding the space station for the last few months. Finally, the spacecraft going up today is not a rescue capsule. In fact, the capsule that the crew is going to take home is the same one the last crew came up on, and it’s been up there since September of last year. So they could have come home at any point if they really needed to.
MARTÍNEZ: NPR science correspondent Geoff Brumfiel, thanks.
BRUMFIEL: Thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF EMILIE LEVIENAISE-FARROUCH’S “VESTIGES”)
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