“NASA was closed, totally closed. There was grass growing on the runways.”

Public remarks comparing administrations on space policy

NASA has operated continuously since its founding in 1958 and has never been closed for a single day. In the years immediately before Trump took office, NASA landed the Curiosity rover on Mars (2012), put the Juno probe in orbit around Jupiter (2016), and kept astronauts living aboard the International Space Station without interruption. The very rocket and capsule Trump celebrates were built under his predecessors. The Space Launch System used for the Artemis II lunar flyby began development under President Obama in 2011, and the Orion crew capsule also predates Trump's presidency, as did the Commercial Crew Program (started 2010) that produced SpaceX's Crew Dragon. Fact-checkers have debunked this exact claim since Trump first tweeted in August 2020 that "NASA was Closed & Dead" before him. CNN's April 15, 2026 fact check called it "simply not true," and Space.com concluded the agency "has never been 'closed' or 'dead.'" The Space Shuttle's 2011 retirement was a planned program transition, not a closure of the agency. "It is NOT correct that NASA was dead under the Obama administration. Much was started, like the commercial crew program … and the beginning of the Space Launch System that will return Americans to the Moon — plus lots of robotic science." — John Logsdon, founder of the Space Policy Institute, George Washington University (to CNN)