from — Office of Space Affairs – United States Department of State. (2020, December 1). United States Department of State. 

Key Topics for Office of Space Affairs (archived)

 SPACE DIPLOMACY       

The President’s National Strategy for Space establishes forthrightly that securing the scientific, commercial, and national security benefits of space is a top priority for this Administration.  OES/SA is advancing the Strategy’s whole-of-government approach to United States leadership in space on several fronts.  We strive for outcomes in international fora that are consistent with U.S. interests; foster conducive domestic and international environments for U.S. companies conducting space activities; and pursue bilateral and multilateral engagements to enable space science and exploration, resilient space services, and burden sharing.  The 1967 Outer Space Treaty, with 107 nations as parties, is considered the backbone of international space law and diplomacy, and an important tool to ensure the peaceful exploration and use of space.

EXPLORATION & COMMERCIALIZATION

The International Space Station is an unprecedented achievement in global human endeavors to plan, build, operate, and utilize a research platform in space, providing over 17 years of continuous human presence in space.  The President’s Space Policy Directive 1 (SPD-1) will return American astronauts to the Moon for long-term exploration and utilization, followed by human missions to other destinations.  OES/SA is working with NASA and the Department of Commerce to further enable cooperation with our international and private industry partners to implement SPD-1 and to develop the infrastructure and policies to spur economic growth in space consistent with Space Policy Directive 2 (SPD-2), focused on the commercial use of space.  Currently, the global space economy is estimated at $348 billion, with the satellite industry representing 79% of the space economy, employing more than 200,000 Americans in areas such as manufacturing, telecoms, earth observation, and ground equipment.

PRESERVING OUTER SPACE

Our society depends on space technologies and space-based capabilities for communications, navigation, weather forecasting, and much more.  These are now at risk due to a significant increase in the volume and diversity of space activity.  Since 2013, there has been a 49% increase in the number of satellites with entities from 60+ countries operating more than 1,700 satellites.  U.S. entities operate almost half of these satellites, some in partnership with other nations.  Space Policy Directive 3 (SPD-3) sets a new approach for space traffic management that will enable our nation to address current and future operational risks.  OES/SA is leading efforts related to international transparency, space object registry, promoting best practices for space safety, and the preservation of the space environment.

GLOBAL NAVIGATION SATELLITE SYSTEMS

The enormous scientific, economic and national security benefits provided by the U.S. Global Positioning System (GPS) has encouraged other countries to pursue regional or global navigation satellite systems, e.g., Europe (Galileo), Japan (QZSS), India (NAVIC), China (Beidou), and Russia (GLONASS).  Per National Space Policy guidance, OES/SA leads the U.S. effort to establish and maintain a system of compatible and inter-operable civil global navigation satellite services with U.S.-based GPS at the core, providing properly equipped users with improved accuracy and increased availability through free and open civil signals.  As a result, consumers and industry have a more robust and reliable service, and U.S. industry can sell multi-system goods and services in the United States (~ $60 billion market) and around the world.

SATELLITE-BASED EARTH OBSERVATION

Orbital satellites are revolutionizing our understanding of many critical earth system processes, including disaster warning and relief, agricultural productivity, epidemic outbreaks, climate, and weather.  OES/SA is advancing interagency efforts to implement international arrangements and promote cooperation on Earth observation satellite systems.  For example, under an arrangement with the European Union, U.S. government agencies can access products and services from the EU’s Copernicus Emergency Management Service, at no cost to the United States.  In combination with U.S. satellite data, these maps are critical tools in our response to natural and man-made disasters.

from — Key topics – Office of Space Affairs – United States Department of State. (2021, January 5). United States Department of State.

Artificial Intelligence (archived)

President Trump signed an executive order establishing what his administration termed the “gold standard for science” early in 2025. The directive publicly required federal agencies to prioritize transparency, reproducibility, and unbiased peer review in research supported by public funds, but in practice, it has become a way for the government to conduct surveillance on innovative research and to control which scientific articles are published. 

This temporarily slows innovation, with the promised benefit of more solid papers and discoveries in the future. Proponents also argued that this policy will strengthen accountability and increase public trust in federally funded science. However, no science is foolproof; as exemplified by RFK’s vaccine policy, even Ph.D. candidates can publish misguided research. For the most part, the general public fears science and phenomena they do not understand. Some researchers have also raised concerns that the framework may expose scientific institutions to political interference. Reuters/Ipsos polling suggests that only one in four Americans believes that recent science-related policies are based on evidence rather than politics, and that number has only gone down with the new legislation. 

The administration’s fiscal approach has had sweeping effects on U.S. science. More than $1 billion in grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF) have been slashed, canceling over 1,600 projects, many of which focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion in STEM. The government has also threatened that any additional grants to the NSF lab are under scrutiny. The policy has turned into a hunt for buzzwords when reviewing grant applications, leading to questions about whether proposals are being judged on scientific merit or ideological conformity. Even papers containing words like “diversity” and “inclusion” in a purely scientific context are being flagged and deplatformed. According to The Guardian, these cancellations have dissolved research teams across the country, forcing cancer trials to shut down in Texas and delaying climate monitoring in Alaska. 

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has also experienced significant budget cuts and staff terminations, causing concerns about future public health preparedness. Experts interviewed by The Guardian warn that weakened leadership may hinder the nation’s ability to respond effectively to future health crises, especially at a level resembling that of COVID-19. Even private companies like Memorial Sloan Kettering have ordered every lab to cut its budget by 10 percent. The administration’s push to slash federal research budgets even further recently met resistance in the Senate, which rebuffed a proposal to reduce spending by 60 percent. 

With the money from these cuts, the Trump administration has placed significant emphasis on advancing already existing “high-priority” technologies. Quantum information science, AI, and 5G communications in rural communities were formally designated as national research priorities. The majority of Trump’s voting demographic is concerned with 5G coverage in their more rural area. Although the administration has cut funding towards certain research projects and universities, the Stanford Human-Centered AI Institute noted that the Trump administration’s AI Action Plan is among the most ambitious federal technology agendas in history. The administration has framed these projects as essential to maintaining U.S. leadership in global innovation.

However, Trump’s policies have been off to a slow start, and they seem to be moving technologies in the wrong direction. For instance, training a single AI model can emit five times more carbon than an average person’s lifetime of car ownership, raising questions about whether U.S. investments align with pre-existing climate goals. Additionally, new legislation has been destroying flagship studies around the country, including renewable energy resources and gender inclusive studies. Cuts to Medicaid-funded university research—never a core Trump platform and not a priority for most of his voters—undermine rural hospitals and drug innovation for low-income Americans. Most worrying, though, is that the CDC and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) have been spreading misinformation to the families of the world, including the false claim that vaccines cause autism. Those organizations have even gone so far as to remove their recommendation for some vaccines. Since their removal, measles and many other diseases have been on the rise.

Scientific research under the Trump administration raises the question: what is more important—partisan technological innovation and development or tested research? The future of U.S. research may well depend on whether these accountability measures strengthen science or strip resources from public health, cancer treatment, and renewable energy studies that Americans rely on in daily life.

from — Nedelkovic, L. (n.d.). Science and Politics: STEM innovation under Trump.