Former NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine says he's “encouraged” that Congress is considering legislation to prevent NASA from spending more than 50 percent of its launch funding on any single provider.
The first thing to say is that Bridenstine isn't part of NASA anymore, he's now a lobbyist for United Launch Alliance or ULA. Of course, he wouldn't say that here, he just says pending legislation will protect the industry and the smaller companies.
“America succeeds in space when American companies compete, innovate, and grow,” former NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine wrote on LinkedIn. “I’m encouraged to see Congress taking meaningful steps to strengthen the industrial base that underpins both our civil and national security space missions.”
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“Congress is reinforcing competition and protecting the small and medium-sized manufacturers, propulsion companies, avionics developers, and suppliers that make up the backbone of America’s space enterprise,” Bridenstine wrote. “Competition lowers costs, accelerates innovation and provides redundancy.”
The legislation Bridenstine is praising is being credited to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), and ranking member Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.). It's a new provision that appears in the NASA Transition Authorization Act of 2025, and Cruz is planning a "markup hearing" for the legislation on Wednesday (3/4).
It's hard to not see this as being aimed at SpaceX just for being so far ahead of the other launch providers. SpaceX launches the only capsule capable of flying astronauts to the International Space Station, Dragon, as well both cargo vehicles currently allowed to fly to the ISS, Cargo Dragon and Northrop Grumman's Cygnus craft. SpaceX has been contracted by Northrop Grumman to launch their Cygnus cargo vessels until Firefly gets Grumman's replacement Antares rocket qualified. The story doesn't end there. In case you haven't noticed, SpaceX has launched lunar landing missions for smaller companies as well as a majority of NASA’s science missions. In other words, NASA flops on the ground without them.
What Bridenstine did not say on social media is that his consulting firm, The Artemis Group, netted $990,000 from United Launch Alliance in 2025, according to public records. This was nearly a third of all revenue raised by his lobbying last year, a total of $3,385,000. United Launch Alliance was formerly a major competitor to SpaceX in the US launch industry.
Interestingly, the Senate’s provision targets launch revenues but has been said to exclude space transportation services (such as the human landers being developed by SpaceX and Blue Origin).
Another former NASA official, Phil McAlister, replied to Bridenstine’s post that it was “disappointing” to see him attach his name to the provision. Instead of promoting competition, McAlister said the new language is actually anti-competitive.
“What it supports is using the political process to funnel money to favored companies with inferior products,” said McAlister, who directed commercial space at NASA from 2005 to 2024. “Competition is a full and open match between companies where the best company wins. If this legislation passes as is, it ensures that the best company will not win. Instead the second or third place company will get an award because they could not compete and win fairly. And the country will see that superior performance does not win, having the best lobbyist does.”
McAlister and other critics of the provision say no one wants a launch monopoly and that NASA has sought to on-ramp new providers through programs such as its venture class services program that allocates payloads to riskier providers. However, they note that, as United Launch Alliance has struggled to bring its Vulcan rocket online over the past five years, SpaceX has stepped up to keep the International Space Station flying and to launch critical missions like NASA’s $4 billion Europa Clipper spacecraft.
It's an interesting footnote that ULA had a monopoly earlier in the company's life; they were formed in 2006 as a joint venture between Lockheed Martin and Boeing, the two giant rocket companies of the time. SpaceX came along and developed the key technology that everyone knew was needed - reusability - but nobody else committed the engineering time and effort to achieve it. The first successful landing of a Falcon 9 was in December 2015, just over a decade ago, and now they've landed boosters for reuse over 600 times and reflown boosters on missions 527 times. Both numbers get revised several times per week.
Now United Launch Alliance must compete not only with SpaceX but a newer generation of more nimble companies building reusable rockets, including Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, Relativity Space, Firefly, and Stoke Space. NASA has made it clear to these companies that it is eager to buy launch services at competitive prices from them.
Bridenstine was generally regarded as a good administrator at NASA; he was in the big seat in May of '20 when SpaceX returned manned spaceflight to the US. On the other hand, once he left NASA, he's become critical of them and Elon Musk. He joined the board of directors of Viasat, a SpaceX competitor. As I look over his history in space leadership, I think that at a total look, he's done well.
It's just that right now, it looks like nothing but the DC Revolving Door, where senior officials go back and forth between government positions and industry. He's getting paid by ULA to attack the competition so he's doing it. Like all whores, he'll put out for whoever is paying.
Jim Bridenstine (L) and Elon Musk in happier times (2020). Image credit NASA
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