Trump's Threat to Kill SpaceX Presents One Hidden Safety Concern
Because of a political fallout, tech mogul and SpaceX owner Elon Musk has now attracted the verbal ire of President Trump. While sparring over social media, the President suggested that he could and would cancel Musk's government contracts relative to SpaceX. Briefly, this led Musk to claim that SpaceX would "decommission" the crucial Dragon spacecraft, but later reversed his position, saying, "Ok, we won’t decommission Dragon." This is the very same type of vessel which recently led to the rescue of astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunni Williams who were stranded on the International Space Station for much longer than originally planned.
And it's the fate of the International Space Station that is actually the number one reason why an utterly defunded SpaceX might be a very dangerous thing. In 2024, NASA awarded SpaceX a contract valued at $843 million. The purpose? To deorbit the International Space Station by the end of the decade. Basically, the ISS is not designed to stay in orbit forever, and before it is replaced by something more permanent, it will have to be safely moved to a low Earth orbit. This means that SpaceX is currently tasked by the U.S. government to build the United States Deorbit Vehicle (USDV).
"Selecting a U.S. Deorbit Vehicle for the International Space Station will help NASA and its international partners ensure a safe and responsible transition in low Earth orbit at the end of station operations," Ken Bowersox said in a NASA statement last year.
Related: Stranded NASA Astronauts Reveal Scariest Moment of Being Stuck in Space
In a hypothetical world in which Trump decides to rescind all government contracts for SpaceX, that would presumably include killing the all-important job of SpaceX building the USDV. And if SpaceX doesn't build the USDV, who will help mitigate the very real fallout of a large space station?
Again, hypothetically, there are other organizations that have spacecraft, but as the stranding of Wilmore and Williams recently demonstrated, SpaceX has proven to be the most reliable way for the U.S. to get people in and out of space. In fact, the whole reason that Wilmore and Williams were stranded was because the Boeing Starliner — a rival aerospace venture to SpaceX — was unable to complete a return trip because of safety concerns.
Concurrent with all of this, Blue Origin's New Glenn craft isn't even close to being ready. Notably, Blue Origin's other craft, the New Shepard, isn't designed to go far enough into space to be useful to the ISS.
Perhaps an interesting milestone: @SpaceX commercial revenue from space will exceed the entire budget of @NASA next year.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 3, 2025
SpaceX revenue this year will be ~$15.5B, of which NASA is ~$1.1B.
One might wonder if SpaceX really needs the money. And it's possible the company doesn't. As Musk pointed out on June 3, the entirety of what NASA pays to SpaceX ($1.1 billion) is dwarfed by SpaceX's current revenue ($15.5 billion). Basically, SpaceX's Starlink services are making plenty of money for the company, so if Trump rescinded even just that contract valued at roughly $800 million, it wouldn't come close to putting SpaceX out of business.
Legally, Trump might be able to try and sever ties between SpaceX and the U.S. government, specifically, NASA. But practically speaking, this seems very unlikely long-term. Right now, SpaceX is the best bet for creating a safe deorbit for the ISS. And, if any more astronauts get stranded — from any country — it seems like Musk's Dragons are still the most reliable space taxi.
Related: SpaceX and Amazon Are Quietly Launching a New Space Race Right Now