Biden reverses Trump, keeps Space Command in Colorado

President Joe Biden has determined that Colorado Springs will be the permanent headquarters of U.S. Space Command, reversing a Trump administration decision to move the facility to Alabama, the Pentagon announced Monday.

The decision will only intensify a bitter parochial battle on Capitol Hill, as members of the Colorado and Alabama delegations have spent months accusing each other of playing politics on the future of the four-star command.

The command was reestablished in 2019 and given temporary headquarters in Colorado while the Air Force evaluated a list of possible permanent sites. With an eye on Russia and China, its job is to oversee the military’s operations of space assets and the defense of satellites.

Pentagon spokesperson Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said Biden notified the Department of Defense on Monday that he had made the decision, after speaking with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and weighing the input of senior military leaders.

“Locating Headquarters U.S. Space Command in Colorado Springs ultimately ensures peak readiness in the space domain for our nation during a critical period,” Ryder said in a statement. “It will also enable the command to most effectively plan, execute and integrate military spacepower into multi-domain global operations in order to deter aggression and defend national interests.”

Austin, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall and U.S. Space Command chief Gen. James Dickinson all support Biden’s decision, Ryder added.

The news, which wasfirst reported by The Associated Press, brings to an end months of speculation about whether Biden would reverse President Donald Trump’s decision to move the command. The Air Force initially recommended the command stay in Colorado, but later selected Alabama after a high-level meeting at the White House in January 2021, during the final days of the Trump administration. Trump latercredited himself for “single-handedly” putting the command in the red state.

Upon taking office, the Biden administration launched its own review of the decision. The Air Force was supposed to make a final determination by December, but a delay fueled months of political feuding. Members of the Colorado delegation claimed Trump decided to move the command to Alabama in order to reward a red state, while Alabama lawmakers said Biden was playing politics in holding up the decision.

The most significant factor Biden weighed in making the decision was the impact such a move would have on the military’s ability to confront the changing threat from space, according to a senior administration official, who like others was granted anonymity to discuss sensitive deliberations.

Keeping the headquarters at Colorado Springs “maintains operational readiness and ensures no disruption to its mission or to its personnel,” according to the official. The command is set to achieve “full operational capability” this month, the official said.

A move to Alabama, by contrast, would have forced the command to transition to a new headquarters in the mid-2020s, and the new site would not have been open until the early to mid-2030s, the official said.

“The president found that risk unacceptable, especially given the challenges we may face in the space domain during this critical time period,” according to the official.

Biden made the decision after consulting with Austin and reviewing the advice of his military leaders, the official said.

The move quickly prompted outrage on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers from Alabama, including Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville, have been outspoken in urging the Defense Department to make the move. Tuberville is already engaged in a pitched battle with the Pentagon over its policy granting leave to troops who must travel to seek an abortion, and is holding up the nominations of more than 270 senior offices until the policy is rescinded.

“It’s clear that far-left politics, not national security, was the driving force behind this decision,” House Armed Services Chair Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) said in a statement. “The Biden administration’s shameful delay to finalize the permanent basing decision for U.S. Space Command warranted the opening of a Congressional investigation. I will continue this investigation to see if they intentionally misled the Armed Services Committee on their deliberate taxpayer-funded manipulation of the selection process.

“This fight is far from over,” he added.

Colorado Sens. John Hickenlooper and Michael Bennet, meanwhile, hailed the decision. They argued that Biden’s move removed politics from the military’s process of deciding where bases should go, and Bennet called Colorado the command’s “rightful home.”

In an interview on Monday evening, Hickenlooper said that Tuberville’s holds on military promotions, while “very frustrating,” did not affect the decision-making process at all. There’s been intense speculation in the Senate that the Alabama senator’s battle against the Pentagon’s abortion policy could drag down Alabama’s bid.

“On a bad day it bugs the living daylights out of me. But it's completely separate from Space Command,” Hickenlooper said. “In my opinion, I believe that's how the Defense Department looked at it. And I think that's how the White House looked at it.”

Instead, he said, the importance of Space Command with regards to the war in Ukraine and getting the base up to full operation capacity was of top importance. Hickenlooper also mentioned that the administration would lose huge amounts of civilian workers if it moved the base to Alabama — which would further hamper getting the headquarters up to speed.

The first-term senator said the decision was not made in regard to “accessory issues; the real question was full operational capability, where is the best location for space command?”

“From when Trump made this decision, the world changed,” Hickenlooper said. “It was no longer a theoretical need that we be at full operational capability. We're in a conflict right now, there's a global conflict with Ukraine. And we've got to make sure that we are fully prepared at all times. Our entire military defense is based on our assets in space.”

Bennet said in a statement: “Over the past two and half years, we have repeatedly made the case that the Trump administration’s decision to relocate U.S. Space Command was misguided. Today’s decision restores integrity to the Pentagon’s basing process and sends a strong message that national security and the readiness of our armed forces drive our military decisions.”

And Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) said on social media: “This is a big win. Colorado has become home to some of the best & brightest minds working in our space & aerospace industries. Allowing U.S. Space Command to continue its vital work, uninterrupted, here in Colorado will help ensure its continued success.”