President reverses a Biden-era decision to keep it at temporary headquarters in Colorado Springs
President Donald Trump’s decision once again to move U.S. Space Command out of Colorado drew immediate condemnation across party lines from the state’s congressional delegation on Tuesday — and raised the specter of a legal challenge.
More than seven months after his return to office, Trump’s long-expected announcement that his administration would move the command to Alabama reversed a Biden-era decision to keep its headquarters in Colorado Springs. A military review previously had recommended the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama, but the Republican president also invoked politics by saying one of the considerations was that voters in Colorado largely vote by mail.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said he was planning a legal challenge to try to stop the relocation. And in a joint statement, the state’s entire congressional delegation said the president’s decision “will directly harm our state and the nation.”
Space Command, the lawmakers stated, is “already fully operational” in Colorado Springs and relocating it “would not result in any additional operational capabilities.” The move “sets our space defense apparatus back years, wastes billions of taxpayer dollars, and hands the advantage to the converging threats of China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea,” the delegation wrote.
Quite a few years ago, I worked at an aerospace company. They decided to transfer operations from California to Alabama, and offered people transfers. Due to cost-of-living differences, that was effectively a massive raise. Uptake of the offer was under 5%, and literally none of the best engineers and managers moved, only the low performers. But the whole rationale was to get a couple cracker senators in their pocket, so I suppose talent retention didn’t matter.
I was working on a project outside the US at the time, so I wasn’t affected until I repatriated a few years later. I walked right out the door, getting a 60% raise when I went (overseas compensation was excellent, but US base salaries were well below market). The work had been technically fascinating, but I didn’t miss the bullshit that went with it.