Biden's space jam

May 15, 2023

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Last fall, Colorado’s MICHAEL BENNET was one of the few front-line Democratic Senate candidates willing to campaign alongside President JOE BIDEN. The main reason: Biden was coming on an official visit to designate Camp Hale as a new national monument, something for which Bennet had pushed.

As they rode together in Biden's motorcade from the Eagle County Regional Airport to the camp through the Aspen gold, Bennet spoke to the president about another Colorado priority: keeping U.S. Space Command in the state — a move that would require Biden to reverse President DONALD TRUMP’s directive to locate Space Command in Alabama.

Biden is set to visit again on June 1 to give the commencement address at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, where Space Command is still being built. Once again, Bennet plans to make his case directly to a president who, much to his consternation, has yet to make a decision on the matter.

“This decision should have been overturned at the beginning of this administration because it was so naked a political decision,” Bennet told West Wing Playbook. “It would be absolutely outrageous if the Biden administration ratified Donald Trump’s political decision.”

Trump announced the decision to relocate Space Command to Huntsville, Ala., on Jan. 11, 2021, five days after the insurrection at the Capitol. The move was purely political, according to the Republican mayor of Colorado Springs, JOHN SUTHERS. Nearly a year earlier, Trump told Suthers he would unilaterally decide where to locate the headquarters but would wait to do so until after the 2020 presidential election, Suthers recently revealed. Colorado, as Trump may have sensed, went for Biden. Alabama, by contrast, went handily for Trump and saw its top elected officials — like former Rep. MO BROOKS — back his lies about the election having been “stolen.”

Bennet’s argument is that Trump’s political vendettas constitute a poor reason to move Space Command to Alabama. But in the last several months, he has hit on a secondary argument for keeping it in Colorado. Following through with Trump’s relocation would mean forcing the military and civilian personnel of Space Command to move from a state where lawmakers have just codified abortion protections — after the Supreme Court overturned Dobbs — to one where lawmakers have banned them with almost no exceptions.

“The bureaucrats at DOD don’t want to admit any of this,” Bennet said. “They want to put blinders on and not look at this question about abortion.”

Before Trump weighed in, Pentagon officials had put Colorado, already home to NORAD, atop the list of potential locations, mainly because a facility there was closest to operational readiness, according to a GAO report.

“The national security rationale that led the generals to recommend it hasn’t changed, and if anything it’s become more compelling,” said Bennet, who noted how critical satellite imaging has been in the Ukraine war and that China has become nearly a peer of the U.S. in space. “It’s easy to look at this and say, ‘Oh, this is just a parochial interest.’ But I think it’s important to restore integrity to the basing process.”

In March, after DAVID IGNATIUS wrote in the Washington Post that the Biden administration “appears ready to reverse” Trump’s relocation order, Bennet asked the White House if that was indeed the case. “They did not confirm that was the direction they’re headed,” he said. “But I’ve heard from the president and others some sympathy with Colorado’s position here.”

An initial review last year by the Pentagon’s inspector general found Trump’s Alabama relocation move “reasonable” and the Government Accountability Office also said the Air Force had “largely followed” the standard base-location process. But the White House requested another review last December, citing concerns that shifting Space Command to Huntsville would delay its operational readiness.

That review is ongoing, according to an Air Force spokesperson. When last asked about the matter publicly in March, Air Force Secretary FRANK KENDALL said “operational capability and mission performance is one of the fundamental things we look at in every basing decision.”

Kendall also suggested he is not expecting Biden to weigh in or act unilaterally as Trump did.

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POTUS PUZZLER

This one is from reader ALEX PENLER. Which first lady was so popular in France that they called her “la belle Américaine,” or “the American beauty” in English?

(Answer at bottom.)

The Oval

PRESIDENTS — THEY’RE JUST LIKE US: The president and first lady attended their granddaughter MAISY BIDEN’s graduation ceremony Monday morning at the University of Pennsylvania. The Bidens “sat in the bleachers to the right of the ceremony, acting like all of the other proud parents and grandparents,” according to print pooler JONATHAN D. SALANT of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Biden was not acknowledged during the ceremony, Salant noted.

BIG WEEK AHEAD: Biden is expected to resume talks Tuesday with congressional leaders at the White House on the debt limit. The meeting was initially supposed to be on Friday, but was postponed so staff-level talks could continue, AP’s SEUNG MIN KIM reports.

Biden is scheduled to leave Wednesday for the G-7 summit in Japan, but the state of the negotiations as the X-date approaches has raised questions about whether the president will have to change up his plans. (After Japan, Biden is scheduled to visit additional world leaders in Papua New Guinea and Australia.) For now, the White House is sticking to the schedule. “We’re planning to conduct this trip as scheduled,” National Security Council spokesperson JOHN KIRBY told reporters on Monday.

WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE WANTS YOU TO READ: This piece by Axios’ MATT PHILLIPS about how gas prices are down by about 30 percent since last June. “It was nigh on one year ago when gasoline crossed a threshold American drivers had never seen before: $5 a gallon,” Phillips writes. “Now? We're back to around $3.50.” Deputy communications director HERBIE ZISKEND and assistant press secretary ABDULLAH HASAN each tweeted out the piece Monday morning.

WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ: This NYT article by ANA SWANSON and NIRAJ CHOKSHI about how tens of millions of dollars in U.S.-made aircraft parts were sent to Russia last year, despite far-reaching sanctions the Biden administration imposed in response to the invasion of Ukraine. “Those shipments were made possible by illicit networks… which have sprung up to try to bypass the restrictions by shuffling goods through a series of straw buyers, often in the Middle East and Asia,” they write.

ICYMI: The president wrote an op-ed for USA Today that published Sunday, the one-year anniversary of the racially motivated shooting in Buffalo, N.Y., that killed 10 people. In the piece, Biden calls on lawmakers to further implement legislation passed in the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act and to advance more comprehensive gun safety legislation.

THE BUREAUCRATS

BERN-OUT: White House principal deputy communications director and a Biden 2020 campaign alum KATE BERNER plans to leave her post “in the coming weeks,” reports one of history’s greatest villains, Axios’ ALEX THOMPSON.

PERSONNEL MOVES: THOMAS TSAI has left the White House, where he was a senior policy adviser for the Covid-19 response for testing and treatments, DANIEL LIPPMAN has learned. He is returning to Harvard Medical School’s Brigham and Women's Hospital, where he is an assistant professor of surgery, and the Harvard Chan School of Public Health, where he is an assistant professor of health policy and management.

— NAVTEJ DHILLON is now chief of staff to National Economic Council director LAEL BRAINARD and a special assistant to the president, Lippman has also learned. He most recently was a special adviser to the National Security Council, where he helped shepherd AJAY BANGA to lead the World Bank.

Filling the Ranks

WE HAVE A NOMINEE, FOLKS: The president Monday announced the nomination of cancer surgeon MONICA BERTAGNOLLI to serve as the National Institutes of Health director. She would fill the role left vacant following the departure of FRANCIS COLLINS, our ERIN SCHUMAKER reports. If confirmed, Bertagnolli will have a big task ahead of her in leading the agency — restoring faith in science after the politicization during the coronavirus pandemic.

Agenda Setting

THE END IS NEAR: The $48 billion Ukraine aid package Congress approved in December is running low with about $6 billion left. That’s raised concerns by some over what the White House plans to do next to continue supporting the nation amid the ongoing Russian invasion, our PAUL MCLEARY, ANTHONY ADRAGNA and JOE GOULD report. A senior administration official said the White House is discussing another aid package and trying to time it so the support flows without interruption.

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What We're Reading

How the Supreme Court might view the debt limit fight (POLITICO’s Betsy Woodruff Swan)

From Rahmbo to Rahm-bassador: How an unlikely diplomat has wooed Japan (WaPo’s Michelle Ye Hee Lee)

Inside Joe Biden’s struggles to create a ‘new world economic order’ (POLITICO Pro’s Gavin Bade)

The Oppo Book

White House science adviser Francis Collins is not only a motorcycle guy — he likes riding his bicycle whenever possible, too.

In a video shot when he was still the National Institute of Health director, Collins, donning a bike helmet and a blue sleeveless Nike cycling shirt, said when he bikes to work, he shows up “energized and in the right state of mind to tackle the day, instead of wanting to tackle other drivers.”

We didn’t know Collins had that kind of road rage, but we encourage you to see the video for yourself, which includes footage of Collins biking around a parking lot.

POTUS PUZZLER ANSWER

ELIZABETH MONROE, the wife of JAMES MONROE, was dubbed “la belle Américaine” before becoming the first lady. She got the nickname after accompanying her husband to France in 1794 when he was serving as a diplomat, according to the White House Historical Association.

A CALL OUT — Thanks to Alex for this question! Do you think you have a harder one? Send us your best one about the presidents with a citation and we may feature it.

Edited by Eun Kyung Kim and Sam Stein.

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