A push by the White House to cut federal staff in President Donald Trump’s proposed 2026 budget could cause more than 2,100 senior-ranking NASA employees to part ways with the space administration, over 300 of them in Florida, according to Politico.
The news outlet cites documents that it obtained that spell out how the 2,145 senior-level NASA employees — all in GS-13 to GS-15 positions, which Politico reports are “typically reserved for those with specialized skills or management responsibilities” — form the bulk of some 2,694 civil staff who have agreed to leave NASA under such offers as early retirement, buyouts and deferred resignations while the Trump administration seeks to lessen the federal workforce.
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Kennedy Space Center is set to lose 311 staff, while other NASA fixtures can expect to lose the following:
Goddard Space Flight Center (Maryland): 607
Johnson Space Center (Texas): 366
NASA headquarters (Washington DC): 307
Langley Research Center (Virginia): 281
Marshall Space Flight Center (Alabama): 279
Glenn Research Center (Ohio): 191
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As the possibility of shortening the Artemis moon program has been considered since administrations changed in Washington this year, Brevard County community correspondent James Sparvero asked SpaceUpClose.com editor Dr. Ken Kremer in a February interview about the worst-case scenario for the space coast.
“You’re gonna have thousands of people laid off, and that is gonna hurt the local economy, hurt tourism, people who wanna see these launches,” Kremer said if Artemis missions are cancelled.
NASA’s Amit Kshatriya with its moon to Mars program answered questions last December about facing an uncertain future.
“I think the way that we do it is we just recognize just how incomparably complex this task is. I don’t think anybody here has any time to think about anything else other than getting this vehicle processed, getting it rolled out to the pad, and then flying the crew safely, frankly.”
If enacted by Congress, adjusted for inflation, this would be NASA’s smallest budget since 1961, the same year that Alan Shepard became the first American in space.
Read more details on Politico’s website.