Billionaire tech entrepreneur Jared Isaacman returned to Capitol Hill Wednesday for his second confirmation hearing for the role of NASA administrator. Members of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation grilled him with questions about a leaked document outlining his controversial vision for the agency.
The manifesto, titled Project Athena, came up repeatedly during the 10 a.m. ET hearing. Senators raised concerns about lines in the document that suggest to them that Isaacman would reevaluate NASA’s plan for a sustained lunar presence, outsource data collection to private companies, and weaken the agency’s climate science capabilities.
For his part, Isaacman largely downplayed their fears, casting them as misinterpretations of Project Athena’s language and its intended purpose.
“I do stand behind everything in the document, even though it was written seven months ago,” Isaacman said before the committee. “I think it was directionally correct, consistent with prior testimony and my interactions with various senators.”
What is Project Athena?
President Trump initially nominated Isaacman to lead NASA at the start of his term. During Wednesday’s hearing, Isaacman testified that he began drafting Project Athena at that time and continued to update the document based on his interactions with NASA leadership and various senators.
He characterized Project Athena as “ideas” and “thoughts” on the direction of the agency. “It was always something that was meant to be refined with actual data should I have been confirmed,” he said.
Isaacman went through his first confirmation hearing in April, but Trump suddenly withdrew his nomination in May, citing concerns about his Democratic campaign contributions and ties to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who was publicly feuding with Trump at the time. In July, the president instated Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy as acting NASA administrator.
Around that time, Isaacman and his team edited the Athena papers down to 62 pages and gave them to Duffy and his chief of staff, Pete Meachum, sources told Ars Technica and Politico. In early November, this edited version was leaked to space lobbyists on Capitol Hill and, ultimately, the press.
The leak made headlines as multiple news outlets—including Ars and Politico—obtained copies of the document and revealed the sweeping changes it reportedly outlines. Gizmodo has not independently verified these details, but senators referenced them multiple times during Wednesday’s hearing.
Isaacman doubles down
Senator Andy Kim (D-NJ) opened questioning on Project Athena, focusing on what he saw as a disconnect between Isaacman’s earlier assurance that he had no initial plans to cancel NASA programs and Athena’s call to reevaluate NASA’s sustained lunar-presence architecture.
The Athena document reportedly recommends canceling the Gateway lunar space station and NASA’s megarocket, the Space Launch System (SLS)—both part of the current architecture for NASA’s Artemis program—after two more missions.
In response to Kim, Isaacman explained that while lines from the 62-page document could be taken out of context, he recognizes the imperative of returning American astronauts to the lunar surface and establishing the infrastructure for a lunar base. He also emphasized the need for a research-backed plan to achieve these goals.
Kim also asked if Isaacman stands by a line from the document that recommends taking NASA “out of the taxpayer-funded climate science business” and “leaving it for academia to determine.”
“If it’s not 10 pages, it could be 20 pages of the 62 that specifically call for research requests from across the associate administrators, the various subject matter experts, to inform a definitive plan,” Isaacman responded. “That’s throughout the entire document.”
Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) later stated that Project Athena “literally banks on the decimation of [NASA’s] scientific capabilities.”
“Among other things, this document calls for NASA to stop collecting its own data and instead set up a taxpayer-funded subscription service from private companies for their products—companies that will set their own price for data that NASA needs to function on an ongoing basis,” Markey said.
Isaacman argued that the senator’s interpretation of this section was completely incorrect. “What that draft document contemplated was working with commercial companies for certain types of Earth observation data,” he explained, adding that companies such as Planet Labs and BlackSky may be able to deliver Earth observation and climate science data at a lower cost.
Isaacman’s responses did not appear to assuage the senators’ concerns. He also faced tough lines of questioning about potential conflicts of interest with Elon Musk and SpaceX, as well as recent donations to pro-Trump political action committees. Whether a Senate majority will be able to overlook these issues and confirm Isaacman remains to be seen.
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