Bill Nelson flew on a space shuttle in 1986 and lost re-election for a fourth Senate term in 2018. Some space advocates fear his approach to the agency could take it backward.
By Kenneth Chang
President Biden on Friday nominated Bill Nelson, a former senator from Florida, to head NASA.
A statement from the White House announcing the nomination said of Mr. Nelson, “In the Senate he was known as the go-to senator for our nation’s space program.”
The selection raised concerns that the Biden administration may restore a more traditional space program that relies on large, legacy aerospace companies such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin, rather than more nimble newcomers like SpaceX.
Many people in the field had also hoped that Mr. Biden would nominate the first woman to serve as administrator.
“Given how many qualified and talented women were rumored to be in consideration, he’s putting great trust in his former Senate colleague,” said Lori Garver, a former deputy administrator of NASA during the Obama administration.
Mr. Nelson, who lost his bid for re-election to a fourth term in 2018, was a onetime astronaut and longtime supporter of NASA in the Senate. He was also a chief architect of the 2010 law that directed NASA to develop a heavy-lift rocket known as the Space Launch System. Although the rocket had a successful engine test on Thursday, it is years behind schedule and billions of dollars over budget.
That has created challenges to the agency’s ability to reach destinations in deep space in the years ahead. Some wonder if Mr. Nelson, as an ardent supporter of the Space Launch System, would be willing to change course if less expensive commercial alternatives like SpaceX’s Starship, currently under development, become available.
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