The shadow over the launchpad

The checks are smaller, the ambitions are bigger, and the lines of accountability are fainter than ever.

The National Space Council survives. NASA’s budget, barely. And Elon Musk—part contractor, part policymaker, part wildcard—casts a long and increasingly controversial shadow over both.

The Council Survives, but to What End?

The recent decision to retain the National Space Council, once thought dead on arrival in the new Trump administration, comes off les…