Trump tasks Musk with rescue mission to return American astronauts stranded at space station

President Donald Trump has tapped Elon Musk to head a rescue mission to return American astronauts from the International Space Station.

In June, NASA astronauts Barry "Butch" Wilmore and Sunita "Suni" Williams became the first people to launch to orbit inside a Boeing Starliner from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The pair of astronauts embarked on a 25-hour flight to the International Space Station.

'Terrible that the Biden administration left them there so long.'

Wilmore and Williams were supposed to be at the ISS for only eight days. However, Boeing's Starliner capsule had issues with the craft's propulsion system. Officials deemed it too dangerous for the astronauts to travel in the Starliner.

Williams and Wilmore are still abandoned at the space station, but Trump and Musk have said the astronauts will be saved.

Trump wrote on the Truth Social app, "I have just asked Elon Musk and SpaceX to 'go get' the 2 brave astronauts who have been virtually abandoned in space by the Biden Administration. They have been waiting for many months on the Space Station. Elon will soon be on his way. Hopefully, all will be safe. Good luck Elon!!!"

“The POTUS has asked SpaceX to bring home the 2 astronauts stranded on the Space Station as soon as possible. We will do so. Terrible that the Biden administration left them there so long,” Musk wrote on the X social media platform on Tuesday.

Wilmore and Williams could return to Earth on SpaceX's Crew Dragon capsule, according to CNBC. The pair would return to Earth with fellow astronauts American Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov.

The departure from the International Space Station was scheduled for February, but it has been delayed.

In December, NASA said the SpaceX Crew-10 is targeting a launch from the ISS with the four astronauts "no earlier than late March 2025." The space agency said the delayed launch would give SpaceX more time to “complete processing” of the new passengers.

A spokesperson with NASA stated, "NASA and SpaceX are expeditiously working to safely return the agency’s SpaceX Crew-9 astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore as soon as practical, while also preparing for the launch of Crew-10 to complete a handover between expeditions."

NASA reportedly did not provide any new updates on the return of the astronauts and did not reveal if the comments made by Trump and Musk would accelerate the rescue mission timeline.

There are currently seven astronauts from around the world on the space station.

Earlier this month, NASA posted a YouTube video of the stranded astronauts at the International Space Station.

Then-NASA deputy chief Pam Melroy jokingly asked the crew, "So what you’re telling us is you’re not channeling ‘Cast Away’ and you don’t have a volleyball with a handprint on it that you call Wilson?”

Wilmore replied, “No, we’ve got a whole team up here so we’re not worried about that, and there’s a lot to do as well. ... We have tons of science experiments. ... We’ve got spacewalks coming up. It’s just been a joy to be working up here."

Williams and Wilmore are part of Expedition 72 — which began in September 2024 and ends in spring 2025 — to have astronauts "explore a variety of space phenomena to benefit humans on and off the Earth including pharmaceutical manufacturing, advanced life support systems, genetic sequencing in microgravity, and more."

The Boeing Starliner was developed under a more than $3 billion NASA contract under the space agency's Commercial Crew Program, according to Reuters.

The Starliner has allegedly had a history of uncrewed testing mishaps, several engineering challenges, and launch delays.

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