Astronauts vs. Musk: Public spat ensues over claims that politics delayed a flight to Earth

Elon Musk has made unfounded claims that two NASA astronauts were left on the space station for “political reasons” after their Boeing spacecraft ran into problems.

Elon Musk and European astronaut Andreas Mogensen exchanged barbs online after Musk suggested in a recent interview that two NASA astronauts were left on the International Space Station “for political reasons.”

The public spat on X came in response to remarks Musk made during a pre-taped, joint interview with President Donald Trump that aired Tuesday on Fox News. The pair was asked about NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, who have been on the space station for the past eight months, after their Boeing spacecraft ran into problems on its first crewed test flight.

“They were left up there for political reasons,” Musk said, insinuating that the Biden administration chose to keep the astronauts in space for longer than necessary.

Mogensen, who in 2015 became the first Danish citizen to fly in space, took aim at Musk’s unsupported claim, posting: “What a lie. And from someone who complains about lack of honesty from the mainstream media.”

In this handout provided by NASA, astronaut Andreas Mogensen emerges out of the SpaceX Dragon Endurance spacecraft on March 12, 2024.
Astronaut Andreas Mogensen emerges out of the SpaceX Dragon Endurance spacecraft on March 12, 2024.NASA / NASA via Getty Images file
Things quickly turned ugly, with Musk calling Mogensen an “idiot” and using a derogatory term.

“SpaceX could have brought them back several months ago,” Musk wrote. “I OFFERED THIS DIRECTLY to the Biden administration and they refused. Return WAS pushed back for political reasons. Idiot.”

Mogensen, who himself flew to and from the space station aboard a SpaceX rocket and capsule, responded 13 minutes later, saying he has “long admired” what Musk has accomplished.

“You know as well as I do, that Butch and Suni are returning with Crew-9, as has been the plan since last September,” he said on X, referring to NASA’s plan to fly Wilmore and Williams back to Earth with two current space station crew members. “Even now, you are not sending up a rescue ship to bring them home. They are returning on the Dragon capsule that has been on ISS since last September.”

Mogensen was commander of the space station from September 2023 to March 2024 — his most recent stay at the orbiting outpost. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

NASA said it is “focused on safely executing our crew rotation missions and work aboard the International Space Station for the benefit of humanity and future long-duration missions to the Moon and Mars.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Retired Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who commanded the space station in 2013, weighed in on the dispute, reposting comments he first made on X on Feb. 14.

“Suni and Butch have never been ‘stranded’ in space,” Hadfield wrote. “They’re prepared and committed to the mission, like all professional astronauts. Suni’s Space Station commander, they’re doing spacewalks, working hard on behalf of NASA and all partners, having the time of their lives.”

The spat comes as Musk’s role as one of Trump’s top political advisers has brought fresh scrutiny to his penchant for spreading false and misleading information. Most recently, Musk has spread a variety of misleading claims about fraud and spending throughout the U.S. government.

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Musk has used Wilmore and Williams’ situation to make a political statement before. A little over a week after Trump’s inauguration, Musk said on X that the president asked SpaceX to bring the two astronauts home “as soon as possible.”

“We will do so,” he wrote. “Terrible that the Biden administration left them there so long.”

Wilmore and Williams launched to the International Space Station aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft in June, intending to spend about a week there as part of the test flight.

However, the capsule encountered several issues, forcing the astronauts to remain at the space station longer than planned. NASA opted to bring the Starliner back to Earth in September with no one aboard.

The space agency, under the Biden administration, decided to call on SpaceX to bring Wilmore and Williams back to Earth. The plan involved shuffling around existing crew assignments to free up two of the four seats on a SpaceX capsule that launched in late September, so that Wilmore and Williams could occupy the seats on the return trip.

That flight had been scheduled for this month, but was postponed to no earlier than late March. The reason, NASA said at the time, was to allow more time to “complete processing” on a new SpaceX spacecraft that will ferry four crew members to the space station.

In a statement, NASA said the launch of that flight, known as Crew-10, and the return of the astronauts on the ISS are both “pending mission readiness and completion of the agency’s upcoming certification of flight readiness process.”

Once the new crew members arrive, Wilmore and Williams, along with NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov, will depart the station on a separate capsule. New and departing crews typically overlap in a handover period, during which astronauts can exchange information about ongoing experiments, maintenance projects and other protocols.

In the Fox News interview, President Trump also doubled down on the unsubstantiated claim that Wilmore and Williams were abandoned.

“They got left in space,” Trump said.

However, the two astronauts have pushed back against that notion in recent interviews.

Speaking to CNN on Feb. 13, Wilmore said: “That’s been the rhetoric. That’s been the narrative from day one: stranded, abandoned, stuck — and I get it. We both get it. But that is, again, not what our human spaceflight program is about. We don’t feel abandoned, we don’t feel stuck, we don’t feel stranded.”

Musk also said Thursday that the space station should be taken out of orbit and that his recommendation was to do so in two years, rather than NASA’s plan to deorbit the facility by 2030.

“It has served its purpose. There is very little incremental utility,” he wrote. “Let’s go to Mars.”

NASA said in a statement that the agency intends to use the International Space Station and other commercial space stations that may be built in the future, as training grounds and laboratories for crewed missions to the moon and Mars.

“We’re looking forward to hearing more about the Trump Administration’s plans for our agency and expanding exploration for the benefit of all,” the statement said.

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