What’s Happening in Space Policy May 18-24, 2025

What’s Happening in Space Policy May 18-24, 2025

By Marcia Smith | Posted: May 18, 2025 5:52 pm ET | Last Updated: May 18, 2025 6:09 pm ET

Here is SpacePolicyOnline.com’s list of space policy events for the week of May 18-24, 2025 and any insight we can offer about them. The House and Senate are in session this week.

During the Week

We thought the big event this week would be SpaceX’s next Starship launch, Integrated Flight Test-9 (IFT-9). SpaceX hasn’t announced a launch date, only that they’re getting close. Reporters at NASASpaceflight.com who closely follow activities at Starbase, however, posted on May 15 that the launch could be May 22, but based on government notices to airmen (NOTAMs) and mariners (LNMs) now say it’s slipped to No Earlier Than (NET) next week.


The delay seems to be for technical reasons, but in addition as of Thursday the FAA hadn’t given them permission to launch. The FAA only received SpaceX’s mishap investigation report for IFT-8 the day before and were still reviewing it.

IFT-8 was the second Starship test flight in a row to explode over the Caribbean.  The FAA needs to close that investigation or make “a return to fight determination” before giving SpaceX a license for IFT-9.

As soon as SpaceX officially announces a launch date/time, we’ll post it on our Calendar.

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill the House continues to focus on trying to get agreement on the reconciliation bill that would extend the 2017 tax cuts, create new tax cuts, increase spending on defense, border security, and energy, and cut spending for most other government programs. House Speaker Mike Johnson is determined to get the House to pass it this week before the Memorial Day recess begins. On Friday, however, four ultra-conservative Republicans joined with all Democrats on the House Budget Committee to defeat the bill 16-21 (a fifth Republican voted no for procedural reasons so he could bring the bill up again). The ultra-conservative Republican no votes were largely because they want deeper spending cuts. The committee is scheduled to vote again tonight (Sunday) at 10:00 pm ET. If it passes, it can go to the Rules Committee tomorrow and then to the House floor for debate by the entire House. That’s what Johnson wants to get done by the end of this week. The House and Senate will be in recess for the Memorial Day holiday next week. The end result of reconciliation likely will affect government spending on space activities, but the debate is largely outside the scope of this website so we’ll leave it there.

Also on the Hill this week, one of the many congressional hearings is space-related. The Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) will hold its annual posture review for the Department of the Air Force (DAF) on Tuesday.  DAF comprises two military services:  the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Space Force. Witnesses are Secretary of the Air Force Troy Meink, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin, and Space Force Chief of Space Operations Gen. B. Chance Saltzman. Meink was just confirmed by the Senate as Secretary of the Air Force on Tuesday and was sworn in on Friday. That doesn’t give him much time to get ready for the hearing, but he has a lot of Air Force experience.  Since 1988 he’s held a variety of Air Force positions as an officer and then as a civilian. Most recently he was Principal Deputy Director of the National Reconnaissance Office.


The spring meeting of the Lunar Surface Innovation Consortium (LSIC) is also this week Tuesday-Thursday at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab in Laurel, MD.  A virtual option is available.

Artist’s rendering of Blue Origin’s Blue Moon MK1. Credit: Blue Moon

Blue Origin’s John Couluris is the industry keynote speaker on Tuesday. He is Blue’s Senior Vice President of Lunar Permanence. Hopefully he’ll have an update on the Blue Moon Mark 1 (MK1) mission expected to launch in August as part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative. Headed to the Moon’s South Pole like many of the CLPS missions, Blue Moon MK1 is a pathfinder for Blue Moon MK2, the much larger and more capable Human Landing System (HLS) for NASA’s Artemis program. Under NASA’s existing Artemis plan, SpaceX’s Starship HLS will deliver U.S. crews to the lunar surface on the first two landing missions, Artemis III and IV.  NASA wants two HLS service providers to ensure “dissimilar redundancy” so if one is grounded for any reason they have another option. Blue Origin is the second provider and Blue Moon MK2’s first mission is slated for Artemis V.

NASA Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) Associate Administrator Clayton Turner and STMD’s Niki Werkheiser also will speak the first day, with lots of interesting panels and breakout sessions to follow. A panel on Thursday morning includes Marchel Holle from the Japanese company ispace that is getting ready to land its RESILIENCE lander and TENACIOUS micro-rover on the Moon on  June 5 EDT (June 6 in Japan). The spacecraft is already in lunar orbit after a several month trip. It launched along Intuitive Machines’ IM-2 in January, but took a different path.


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

Sunday-Wednesday, May 18-21

Monday, May 19

Monday-Wednesday, May 19-21

Tuesday, May 20

Tuesday-Thursday, May 20-22

Wednesday, May 21

Thursday, May 22

Last Updated: May 18, 2025 6:09 pm ET

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