Biden officials take grilling from House lawmakers over Space Command decision

Top Biden administration officials struggled to fend off accusations and incendiary questions Thursday from House lawmakers who accused them of poor decisionmaking and political bias in establishing a headquarters for U.S. Space Command.

During a House Armed Services Committee (HASC) hearing, lawmakers pummeled Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall and Gen. James Dickinson, the head of Space Command, for what they said was an attempt to punish Alabama by refusing to house Space Command in the state for political reasons.

The officials defended the decision to keep Space Command in Colorado Springs, Colo., instead of transferring it to Huntsville, as originally planned, arguing it would maintain military readiness.

“Readiness manifests itself in the transition process of moving to another location,” Kendall said, adding the process of “losing civilian workforce and having to reestablish a trained workforce at the new location” impacts military operational capabilities.

President Biden’s choice for the headquarters has infuriated Alabama lawmakers, who repeatedly accused the officials of selecting Colorado because it would favor Biden’s political campaign.

Alabama Rep. Terri Sewell (D) said Huntsville is the best location because it has a cheaper cost-of-living, a plethora of engineers and a history as a space center.

“No place is more equipped, competent, capable and better suited to headquarter the Space Command,” she said. “We’ve made a political decision over a competency decision. … This is simply unfair.”

But it wasn’t just Alabama lawmakers who were upset.

Several members of the committee from other states, most of them Republicans, either cried foul or expressed disappointment in a decision process that created a major clash over the future of the headquarters.

“This has been a horrible process,” said Democratic Rep. Adam Smith (Wash.), ranking member of the committee, saying the American people were owed an explanation for “how exactly we bollocksed up a decision to build a command headquarters.”

Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), the chairman of the committee who is investigating the Space Command decision, said the argument that relocation would harm operational readiness is “fabricated” and that he intends to ensure there are no funds for a permanent headquarters in Colorado.

“There is no reason to justify what’s happened other than my view, political considerations,” he said. “We need to demonstrate to the American people that preparedness and not politics determines important investments like this.”

Despite the grilling, lawmakers provided little new evidence that would have directly shown the decision was politically motivated, other than accusations.

Former President Trump revived Space Command in 2019 and allowed a temporary headquarters in Colorado’s Peterson Air Force Base while a permanent location would be in Alabama’s Redstone Arsenal base.

The Biden administration has inquired into whether that was a political decision, but no independent reviews found any wrongdoing.

However, Biden said in late July he would keep the headquarters in Colorado because it would maintain military readiness, as the base could not become operational until the early 2030s at best. Both Kendall and Dickinson leaned into that argument Thursday and said the process was based on sound military decision.

Dickinson said he expects Space Command to become fully operational by the end of the year in Colorado.

“In my view, selecting Colorado Springs as the permanent basing location for U.S. Space Command best sustains our human capital investments and ultimately maintains our readiness at the highest levels while imposing the least disruption,” he said.

But Alabama lawmakers insisted at the hearing that there was more to the story than meets the eye.

Huntsville finished in first place in two Air Force reviews that conducted a national survey of the best location, while Colorado Springs finished fourth and fifth. Lawmakers said the U.S. military should be choosing the best options available.

“This deal smells mighty funky,” Rep. Nick LaLota (R-N.Y.) said at the hearing. “Both Republicans and Democrats are skeptical of how fifth place was chosen over first place.”

Lawmakers also accused the administration of choosing Colorado because Alabama has restrictive abortion laws, arguing the Yellowhammer State is being punished — a charge that Kendall denied. NBC News had reported in May the Biden administration was considering ditching the relocation plan because of abortion laws in Alabama.

Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-Texas) said it was suspicious the decision came after Alabama enacted near-total abortion laws and amid GOP Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s hold on senior officers over a Pentagon abortion policy.

“It was purely politics, the politics of abortion in America,” he said.