Jared Isaacman told his nomination as NASA administrator will be withdrawn
Jared Isaacman, President Donald Trump’s pick to be NASA administrator, has been told by the White House that his nomination will be rescinded, according to a person who has been briefed on the notification.
Isaacman, a billionaire entrepreneur, had been approved by the Senate Commerce Committee and was preparing for a vote in the full Senate as early as next week. But on Friday he was told that the nomination was going to be pulled, according to the person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about personnel moves.
Isaacman declined to comment. Semafor first reported the news. A White House spokeswoman issued a statement Saturday saying Trump planned to pick a new nominee.
“It is essential that the next leader of NASA is in complete alignment with President Trump’s America First agenda and a replacement will be announced directly by President Trump soon,” said White House spokeswoman Liz Huston.
It was not immediately clear what led the White House to change course.
There were indications of division among Republicans over the move. Some in Congress had been concerned about his connections to SpaceX and Elon Musk, who recently ended his term as head of the U.S. DOGE Service. Isaacman flew twice to space with SpaceX and had commissioned two more flights with the company.
Isaacman, the founder and CEO of Shift4 Payments, had the backing of much of the space community. And some of Isaacman’s allies, including Musk, are trying to lobby the White House and Trump to keep Isaacman, the person said.
His nomination came at a time when the White House is proposing drastic cuts to NASA. On Friday, it released its budget request, which called for a 24% reduction. It is the smallest request since 1961, adjusted for inflation, according to the Planetary Society.
Most of the cuts would come to the space agency’s science programs and amount to what the Planetary Society called “an extinction-level event.”
Laura Loomer, a right wing activist who has been influential in the administration, wrote in a post on X that “there is reason to believe that Isaacman may be facing retaliation because of his friendship with @elonmusk. If so, this would suggest there is a coordinated hit job on Isaacman in an effort to damage ties between President Trump and Elon Musk before the 2026 midterms, even though the two of them just held an Oval Office meeting and press conference yesterday where @POTUS praised Elon for for his generosity, his work at @DOGE, and even gave Elon a key to the White House.”