President Donald Trump's decision to relocate the headquarters for the U.S. Space Command from Colorado to Alabama on Tuesday was met with fierce criticism.
During a news conference, Trump said Colorado's mail-in voting laws influenced his decision to relocate the agency. "They do mail-in voting, they went to all mail-in voting, so they have automatically crooked elections," he said, baselessly, according to NBC News.
Trump's decision was slammed on social media.
"Coloradans and Americans should all be provided full transparency and the full details of this poor decision," Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, a Democrat, said in a statement, adding that Colorado is still an "ideal location" for other missions like Trump's proposed "Golden Dome" project.
"Today’s decision to move U.S Space Command’s headquarters out of Colorado and to Alabama will directly harm our state and the nation," Colorado's bicameral Congressional delegation said in a statement. "Moving Space Command sets our space defense apparatus back years, wastes billions of taxpayer dollars, and hands the advantage to the converging threats of China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea."
"For anyone not watching, the Space Command press conference is like the Cliff Notes version of the 3-hour-long cabinet meeting where everyone told Trump how much of a visionary he is and how they're all so honored to work for him," Mike Boylan-Kolchin, astronomy professor at the University of Texas, Austin, posted on Bluesky.
"Just to get ahead of things, I live in Alabamastan and think it's stupid to move Space Command – or really, anything – here," writer Scott Adamson posted on Bluesky.
"Moving Space Command to Alabama is silly," writer and film critic Eric D. Snider posted on Bluesky. "Also silly: Space Command."
"U.S. Space Command is the central nervous system of our government's nuclear infrastructure," writer Charlotte Clymer posted on Bluesky. "This is why Pres. Biden chose to headquarter U.S. Space Command in Colorado in 2023. Because all the pertinent Space Force facilities were already there. Peterson, Schriever, Cheyenne Mountain, and Buckley military bases, the whole of USSPACECOM. Sure, it saved money, but it was common sense."