President Donald Trump signed an executive order creating the U.S. Space Academy, a NASA-led federal academy to train the next generation for the Space Force, NASA, and the commercial space industry.
The United States is getting its first space-focused military academy. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday establishing the U.S. Space Academy, a new federal institution designed to train the next generation of service members, engineers, and space professionals for the Space Force, NASA, and America's booming commercial space industry.
The signing took place during the president's visit to NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, where he described the academy as a direct response to America's accelerating ambitions beyond Earth.
The order establishes a Presidential Commission on the United States Space Academy, chaired by the NASA Administrator. The commission's job is to design the academy and deliver recommendations to the president covering everything from governance and curriculum to service obligations and site selection.
The proposed academy is a NASA-led federal institution that pairs rigorous technical education with leadership development, discipline, and a durable commitment to public service. Graduates would be prepared for careers supporting America's military, civil, and broader space enterprise.
Trump said the rapid growth of the Space Force and the commercial space industry, along with the expansion of American ambitions to the moon and beyond, made the academy necessary.
"It's clear that we need to educate and train an entire generation of skilled service members, engineers, civil operators and everything else to do what we have to do," he said.
The academy announcement capped a landmark day at the Houston facility. Trump became the first president in history to call American astronauts aboard the International Space Station from Mission Control, and he presented the Congressional Space Medal of Honor to the crew of the Artemis II mission, which flew around the moon earlier this year.
"I just congratulate everybody. And be careful. Be safe. And we love you all," the president told the crew, informing them of the new service academy.
Astronaut Jack Hathaway, a U.S. Navy officer and Naval Academy graduate, welcomed the news. "I graduated from the Naval Academy. I'm sure they're more than excited to support it and have it on board," he told the president.
Jessica Meir, the current space station mission commander, said the crew would keep working to "inspire all of the bright minds and the next generation."
The academy is the latest chapter in a space policy record that dates to Trump's first term, when he spearheaded the creation of the Space Force, the first new branch of the armed forces in more than 70 years. It follows seven first-term Space Policy Directives that launched the Artemis program, reformed commercial space regulation, and set cybersecurity standards for space systems.
That momentum has continued through 2026. In April, Artemis II carried American astronauts to lunar orbit for the first time in more than half a century. In December 2025, Trump signed an executive order setting an America First vision for space policy, and in August of this year he signed a National Security Presidential Memorandum aimed at enabling more than 1,000 launches and reentries on American soil annually by 2030.
The Federal Aviation Administration also moved this summer to waive burdensome environmental reviews for launch infrastructure, clearing the way for a commercial launch renaissance.
The academy would fill a widening gap: cutting-edge technical fields tied to space currently do not produce enough graduates to guarantee American superiority, and the new institution is designed to change that.
Trump offered few details about the academy's future home, telling the Houston audience he would be choosing a location "very shortly." The commission will weigh in on the permanent site, along with curriculum, applicant prerequisites, pilot programs, and the legislative strategy needed to stand the institution up.
Once the president approves the commission's recommendations, the NASA Administrator will lead implementation in coordination with relevant agencies.
For a nation setting its sights on the moon and far beyond, the U.S. Space Academy signals that America intends to lead in space not just with rockets, but with the people who fly them. As Trump put it, far beyond the moon will someday be thought of as a close location -- "like, in the old days, the subway, the first stop."
President Donald Trump signed an executive order creating the U.S. Space Academy, a NASA-led federal academy to train the next generation for the Space Force, NASA, and the commercial space industry.
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