What’s Happening in Space Policy August 2-8, 2026

Here is SpacePolicyOnline.com’s list of space policy events for the week of August 2-8, 2026 and any insight we can offer about them. The Senate is in session this week. The House is on summer break, with only pro forma sessions between now and August 31.

During the Week

The Senate is scheduled to leave for its summer recess at the end of this week.  Some Senators want to postpone or cancel recess until the Senate passes President Trump’s voting bill despite Senate Majority Leader John Thune’s (R-SD) firm assessment that there are not enough votes to do so. The situation may change, but as of today this is their last week in session until September 14.

The House began its recess on July 24. Before leaving, they got an early start on a Continuing Resolution (CR) to keep the government operating after October 1 when FY2027 begins. That’s not all that far away and it’s unlikely any of the appropriations bills will clear Congress by then. The bill would keep the government open through December 4 and narrowly passed by a vote of 220-205.

The Senate is expected to try and pass its own CR this week. Senate Appropriations Committee chair Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) introduced a bipartisan bill this afternoon. It would fund the government through December 11.

It has many differences from the House bill. One of special interest to the science and space communities is Sec. 157, which prohibits the Office of Management and Budget from implementing a proposed rule, Regulation for Federal Financial Assistance, that would fundamentally change how federal grants are awarded. The effect would be very broad, but the American Astronomical Society and the Planetary Society have useful overviews of the impact on science and space. The CR would block it only temporarily, however, requiring OMB to continue reviewing the nearly 500,000 comments that were received for the duration of the CR. In a press release this afternoon, Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Connecticut), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, cheered the Senate committee’s bill, but stressed OMB’s proposed rule must be eliminated entirely.

Whatever passes the Senate, a compromise will have to be worked out with the House in a short period of time. Between when they return — the House on August 31, the Senate on September 14 — and the end of FY2026 on September 30, the House will be in session for 15 days and the Senate for 12 days. (Both will be out the week of September 7 for Labor Day.)

Off the Hill, summer vacation is in full swing. The number of space events may be modest, but there’s plenty of interest.

Several space companies are releasing their second quarter 2026 financial results this week. One that is certain to garner a lot of attention is SpaceX’s first quarterly results since the company went public in June. The earnings call is on Tuesday at 4:30 pm ET.  Voyager Technologies and Redwire also release their Q2 results this week (Tuesday and Thursday, respectively). Audio of all these earnings calls are livestreamed on the companies’ websites.

NASA is always busy, of course. This week there are two news conferences about the upcoming launch of Crew-13, a post-mission news conference with Chris Williams who just returned from an 8-month mission, and two NASA astronauts will perform a spacewalk.

Crew-13 will launch to the ISS in September to replace Crew-12. The crew includes NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins (commander) and Luke Delaney (pilot), and mission specialists Joshua Kutryk (Canadian Space Agency) and Sergey Teteryatnikov (Roscosmos).  Tomorrow (Monday), NASA will have a news conference first with NASA, CSA and SpaceX officials and then with the crew itself.

On Tuesday, NASA astronaut Chris Williams will discuss his Soyuz MS-28 mission. He and his Roscosmos crewmates Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikaev returned to Earth on July 26, landing in Kazakhstan after 241 days in space. This was his first spaceflight and he conducted two spacewalks in addition to a wide range of scientific experiments including research on new cancer treatments and in-space manufacturing.

On Thursday, NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Anil Menon will conduct the first of a set of three spacewalks planned for August.  Meir and Menon will install hardware to prepare for installation of the next ISS Roll-Out Solar Array (iROSA). It will be the seventh of eight iROSAs to be installed over existing solar arrays to boost the electrical power on the ISS.  This is Meir’s sixth spacewalk and Menon’s first. The other August spacewalks are planned for August 13 and August 25.

We’ll also be keeping an eye on Katalyst Space’s progress in regaining control of their LINK spacecraft that they hope to use to reboost NASA’s Swift observatory this month. Katalyst reported on Wednesday that LINK was in a multi-axis spin, but they were hopeful they could get it under control and continue with the mission. The next day they said they’d been able to reduce the spin rate from 9 degrees per second to approximately 4 degrees per second and were working with NASA on developing a new attitude controller. NASA said on Friday they’re working on “revised, innovative approaches.”  All of this is delaying the LINK-Swift rendezvous until the end of August. The effort has a tight deadline. Swift’s orbit is decaying more quickly than expected due to increased solar activity. After October, a reboost probably won’t be possible.

Those and other events we know about as of Sunday afternoon are shown below. Check back throughout the week for others we learn about later and add to our Calendar or changes to these.

Sunday-Sunday, August 2-9 (continued from August 1)

• Committee on Space Research (COSPAR), Florence, Italy

Monday, August 3

• Two NASA Briefings on Crew-13, JSC (watch on NASA YouTube)
  • 12:00 pm ET, Mission Briefing with NASA, CSA and SpaceX officials
  • 2:00 pm ET, Crew Briefing with the crew members

Tuesday, August 4

• Voyager Technologies 2nd Quarter 2026 Financial Results, virtual, 9:00 am ET
• NASA Astronaut Chris Williams Post-Mission News Conference, JSC, 2:45 pm ET (watch on NASA YouTube)
• SpaceX 2nd Quarter 2026 Financial Results, virtual, 4:30 pm ET

Wednesday, August 5

• Planetary Research Program Metrics (Committee on Astrobiology and Planetary Science, National Academies), 12:00-2:00 pm ET (details TBA)
• ISU-DC Space Café with Planet’s Mark Mozena, 1020 N Highland St., Arlington, VA, 6:00-8:00 pm ET

Thursday, August 6

• NASA Spacewalk at ISS (Meir, Menon), Earth orbit, 8:35 am ET (NASA coverage begins 7:00 am ET)
• Redwire 2nd Quarter 2026 Financial Results, virtual, 9:00 am ET
• JAXA H3 Launch of QZS-7, Tanegashima, Japan, 3:30 pm ET (August 7, 04:30 JST)