On Tuesday, President Trump announced that Space Command headquarters is moving to Alabama, reversing former President Biden’s decision to keep the command in Colorado.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed to Fox News that Tuesday’s announcement was related to the Defense Department.
Trump said the move will create 30,000 jobs in “Rocket City.”
The agency initially posted a livestream link for Trump’s 2 p.m. announcement with a description that the event was related to Space Command’s headquarters. The description was subsequently updated to remove the mention of Space Command.
Trump signed an executive order in 2018 reestablishing U.S. Space Command, after it had been absorbed in 2002 into U.S. Strategic Command.
Its main goal is to find ways to defend U.S. interests in space, especially the constellations of satellites that U.S. ground, sea and air forces rely on for navigation, communications and surveillance.
The announcement comes as both Colorado and Alabama have been vying to house Space Command, which Trump established in 2019 as a new combatant command to oversee U.S. military space operations and is currently involved in Trump’s Golden Dome initiative. (RELATED: Trump Unveils Plans For ‘Golden Dome’ Missile Shield For US)
In 2023, President Joe Biden opted to keep Space Command headquarters in Colorado, where its temporary headquarters was located, overturning Mr. Trump’s first-term decision to move it to Alabama.
Proponents of keeping Space Command at Colorado’s Peterson Space Force Base argue that it would be costly to move the headquarters, given the investment already put into Peterson to accommodate the command there.
However, the Air Force concluded in 2021 that Army Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama, would be the ideal location for U.S. Space Command. The town is also home to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and the Army’s Space and Missile Defense Command.
Trump indicated last Monday he could move to rename the Department of Defense as the Department of War in the near future. The president has argued it was called the Department of War during U.S. victories in World War I and World War II.
“Defense is a part of that,” Trump said. “But I have a feeling we’re going to be changing. Everybody likes that. We had an unbelievable history of victory when it was Department of War.”
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