Ted Cruz sounded more like John F. Kennedy Wednesday when the notorious budget hawk and climate skeptic called for deeper pockets and even deeper space missions in his first statement as head of the Senate subcommittee that oversees NASA.
“We must refocus our investment on the hard sciences, on getting men and women into space, on exploring low-Earth orbit and beyond, and not on political distractions that are extraneous to NASA’s mandate,” the Texas Republican said in a Wednesday statement.
“I am excited to raise these issues in our subcommittee and look forward to producing legislation that confirms our shared commitment to this vital mission.”
Cruz took over the Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Space, Science and Competitiveness — which oversees NASA — last week as Republicans formally began exercising their new majority in the upper chamber.
In a statement that surprised critics of the firebrand — who has frequently targeted ambitious government spending in his political tactics — Cruz applauded NASA’s deep space efforts, and expressed support for private companies including SpaceX, which is currently contracting with NASA to send supplies, and eventually astronauts, to the International Space Station.
“U.S. astronauts once again will travel to and from the International Space Station from the United States on American spacecraft under groundbreaking contracts NASA announced Tuesday,” Cruz said. “The agency unveiled its selection of Boeing and SpaceX to transport U.S. crews to and from the space station using their CST-100 and Crew Dragon spacecraft, respectively, with a goal of ending the nation’s sole reliance on Russia in 2017.”
Cruz said allowing Russia to be the “gatekeeper” to the ISS endangers the U.S.’s ability to push the boundaries of space exploration, and the economic and technological innovation it drives. (RELATED: NASA: By 2017 Astronauts Will Launch From America, Not Russia)
“The United States should work alongside our international partners, but not be dependent on them,” Cruz said. “We should once again lead the way for the world in space exploration.” (RELATED: Boeing And SpaceX Win NASA Contracts For New Manned Spaceflight Programs)
The core of the U.S.’s public and private space industry is situated throughout Cruz’s home state, where NASA’s Johnson Space Center is located and where SpaceX purchased land to build its own private spaceport in Brownsville last year, which is expected to create more than 500 direct jobs, pull $85 million in capital investment into the city and pay $51 million in annual salaries, according to USA Today.
“Texas has a major stake in space exploration,” Cruz said. “Our space program marks the frontier of future technologies for defense, communications, transportation and more, and our mindset should be focused on NASA’s primary mission: exploring space and developing the wealth of new technologies that stem from its exploration. And commercial space exploration presents important new opportunities for us all.”
The statement comes days after The Huffington Post, Slate and other outlets slammed the Texas senator for taking the post, despite supporting a government shutdown that closed NASA for two weeks in 2013 and taking skeptical positions on climate change studies, of which NASA is an integral participant in the public sector.