Trump to move U.S. Space Command headquarters from Colorado to Alabama
The Trump administration plans to move the U.S. Space Command headquarters from Colorado to Alabama, according to two people familiar with the matter, marking the latest twist in a years-long partisan battle over the agency’s home.
President Donald Trump plans to announce the decision from the White House Tuesday afternoon, these people said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to disclose the development ahead of time.
The move appears to cement a major win for Alabama’s congressional delegation, including the Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. Mike D. Rogers.
The Pentagon referred questions about the announcement to the White House, which declined to comment.
The news was reported earlier by Politico and the Associated Press.
Space Command dates back to the 1980s, when it was established to oversee the U.S. military’s vast array of satellites and coordinate with other high-level headquarters. In 2002, it was merged into U.S. Strategic Command at Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska before being reestablished under Trump in 2019, as moves by Russia and China forced U.S. officials to assign higher priority to a domain where the Pentagon once had little competition.
The Alabama and Colorado congressional delegations both have argued that their states would be the most appropriate to house the command’s headquarters, given Huntsville’s connections to the space industry and Colorado Spring’s ties to the Air Force.
The Air Force in 2021 said it preferred Huntsville - home to Redstone Arsenal and NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center - for the command’s headquarters. In 2023, though, the Biden administration opted to keep it based in Colorado Springs.
Rogers and other lawmakers from his state, meanwhile, vowed to keep fighting the decision, and the possibility of a move became far more likely after Trump returned to office earlier this year.
Space Command coordinates U.S. military activities in space, including satellite communications, defending government satellites from harm and some aspects of missile defense. It is distinct from the Space Force, the Defense Department’s newest service.
Both organizations have grown in importance as the United States and its rivals, including Russia and China, increasingly look at space as an area for military competition. In recent years, U.S. generals have warned that China especially is making rapid advances in satellite technology.
Huntsville has long been a hub for aerospace and defense. The NASA spaceflight center located there employs more than 6,000 people supporting engineering and science research. Many aerospace companies also have offices in the area, including Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman.