Houston, TX — President Donald Trump announced Friday that he is signing an executive order establishing a United States Space Academy.
The announcement came during a ceremony at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, where Trump awarded the Congressional Space Medal of Honor to the Artemis II crew.
Trump said the academy will train the next generation of service members, engineers, and operators and will serve the U.S. Space Force as well as NASA and the civilian spaceflight industry.
He said it will attract, train, and graduate “the very best our nation has to offer,” and that a location will be chosen “very shortly.”
No site has been selected.
The academy was described as a dedicated institution alongside the existing service academies.
Trump also honored Artemis II astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, along with Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen. The crew completed a 10-day mission around the Moon in April, the first crewed flight beyond the Moon in more than 50 years.
A location for the academy has not been named. Texas is home to Johnson Space Center, SpaceX’s Starbase launch site in Cameron County, and a large aerospace workforce, but officials have not announced that the academy will be built in Texas.