NASA, Pentagon push for SpaceX alternatives amid Trump's feud with Musk
washingtonpost.com
washingtonpost.com
Having said that someone should be able to complain about the president and not have their business threatened for it.
This whole Trump's personal gripes are government policy system is antithetical to the constitution, free speech, and so on.
It was inevitable that critical mission overseers would have to assess the state of their fallback options...
Since Thursday's exchange, at least three commercial space companies, Rocket Lab, Stoke Space and Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin, have been contacted by government officials about the status of their rockets and when they might be available for government missions, according to four people familiar with the inquiries.
Officials at Sierra Space, which is developing a Dream Chaser spaceplane that could deliver cargo to the space station, were in a meeting with NASA officials on Thursday as the Trump-Musk feud was getting underway. "Sierra Space stands ready to ensure uninterrupted support for the International Space Station," Fatih Ozmen, the company's CEO, said in a statement to The Post.
The Pentagon has had to deal with once-trusted contractors going off the rails before and they will have to deal with it again. There are two key issues: what does the USA need from SpaceX to meet contracted Defense needs and what are the new national security risks associated with current SpaceX operations under the staff that's loyal to this guy. Will the military take control while the Pentagon figures out how to transfer permanent control to trusted parties and the bean counters resolve the accounting?