President Donald Trump has ordered the creation of a commission to plan a national Space Academy, putting NASA at the center of an effort that could produce a new pipeline for military officers, engineers and civilian space workers. The commission has 120 days to submit recommendations on key details for establishing the academy. Defense One reported that the order directs the panel to examine whether graduates should incur service obligations, including service in the armed forces.
Trump signed the executive order at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston during a ceremony where he presented the Congressional Space Medal of Honor to the four crew members scheduled to fly the Artemis II mission around the Moon. The commission will include Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Air Force Secretary Troy Meink, and NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman will chair it.
The order calls for the commission to plan an institution intended to strengthen the national space workforce. It also directs the panel to consider admissions requirements involving citizenship, security clearances, government employment and military status. The order leaves unresolved details about the academy and its interaction with the armed services and existing officer-commissioning pathways.
A White House fact sheet described the proposed school as combining technical education, leadership development and public service for careers supporting the military, civil and broader space sectors. Isaacman tied the concept to the administration’s stated plans for lunar exploration, a Moon base, nuclear power in space, commercial orbital activity and additional science missions.
The proposal could affect how the Space Force commissions officers. The service currently brings in new officers through the Air Force Academy, Reserve Officers’ Training Corps and Officer Training School, while also recruiting from universities through its University Partnership Program. The order’s requirement that the commission evaluate service obligations suggests that graduates could be directed into military careers, but it does not establish a new commissioning route or impose a service commitment now.
The order also directs the commission to examine prerequisites for applicants, including citizenship status, security clearances and government employment or military status. Those provisions connect the proposed institution to both civilian and military workforce needs, but the report will determine how those requirements fit into the academy’s design and its relationship with existing pathways.
The need for another institution is disputed. The Space Force has not struggled to meet its uniformed recruiting goals, and service leaders have proposed doubling the number of its guardians. At the same time, the service is rebuilding its civilian workforce after cuts during the previous year’s federal workforce purge and has been seeking talent to manage a requested $71.3 billion budget, which the Aerospace Corporation described as the largest year-on-year percentage increase requested by any military service branch since 1952. Those workforce conditions point in different directions: uniformed recruiting is strong, while civilian staffing remains a concern.
Todd Harrison, a defense budget and space expert at the American Enterprise Institute, said the proposal was “out of left field” and argued that NASA, the Space Force and intelligence agencies already have defined responsibilities. He also questioned why the government would create a new academy when public and private universities already produce aerospace and engineering graduates. Harrison said the Space Force’s recruiting relationships with universities make the rationale for a separate school unclear, and that Congress would need to authorize and fund the institution.
The concept predates the executive order. The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 playbook proposed exploring a Space Force Academy to attract aerospace students, engineers and scientists and develop astronauts. It envisioned initially attaching the academy to a major research university, sharing faculty and funding, and eventually creating a standalone institution comparable to the existing service academies.
The commission must submit its report to Trump within 120 days. The order directs the panel to propose key details for establishing the Space Academy, including the issues surrounding admissions, service obligations and its relationship with the armed services and officer-commissioning pathways.