We’re finally getting to hear the stranded astronauts’ side of the story.
Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams had originally traveled up to the International Space Station for a week-long mission in June of 2024. They traveled up to the ISS in a Boeing Starliner on a mission that was really designed to test the strength of the spacecraft. And it was certainly a test, as the Starliner suffered multiple helium leaks and experienced thruster issues. NASA opted to send the aircraft back down to Earth without anyone aboard, which left the pair of astronauts stranded up in space until the next mission.
All in all, the trip that was supposed to last 8 days ended up lasting 286. It was only when Elon Musk’s SpaceX stepped in to help bring them home that the astronauts were able to prepare to go back to Earth. Musk and Trump had implied that the astronauts could have been saved earlier, but former President Joe Biden decided to leave them there until after the November election. There’s some belief that Trump “expedited” the process for SpaceX to bring the astronauts back home.
And after the astronauts splashed down into the Gulf of America in their return home, everyone has been waiting to hear from Wilmore and Williams.
Fox News finally got an exclusive with the pair of headline-making astronauts, and the two were very candid about the entire process that ultimately got them stuck up on the International Space Station. Butch Wilmore, a Tennessee native, suggested that Boeing and NASA had to shoulder some of the blame:
“I’ll admit that to the nation. There’s things that I did not ask that I should have asked. I didn’t know at the time that I needed to ask them,’ he added. But in hindsight, the signals, some of the signals were there.
Is Boeing to blame? Are they culpable? Sure. Is NASA to blame? Are they culpable? Sure. Everybody has a piece in this because it did not come off. There were some shortcomings in preparation that we did not foresee.
Could you point fingers? I don’t want to point fingers because I hope nobody wants to point fingers. We don’t want to look back and say, ‘Shame, shame, shame.’ We want to look forward and say, ‘Let’s rectify what we’ve learned and let’s make the future even more productive.'”
And like I mentioned earlier, it was believed that former President Joe Biden was hesitant to bring the astronauts back home while he was still in office (during an election year). The Fox News reporter asked if there was any credibility to that speculation that President Donald Trump had presented, and Wilmore’s answer to that question went like this:
“I have no reason not to believe anything they say, because they’ve earned my trust. And for that, I am grateful that our national leaders actually are coming in and taking part in our human spaceflight program – which we see as hugely important (and having) global significance. They take an active role, and based on the past and what we see now, it’s refreshing. Not just refreshing, it’s empowering. It’s strengthening.”
JUST IN: NASA astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams speak out after being ‘abandoned’ on the ISS for over nine months
Wilmore responded to Trump’s claim that the Biden administration ‘abandoned’ them in space, saying, “I have no reason not to believe anything they say… pic.twitter.com/JsikTkDf8F
— Unlimited L's (@unlimited_ls) March 31, 2025
President Trump and Elon Musk are “Making Space Travel Great Again” I suppose?
The post Stranded Astronaut Says That President Trump “Earned His Trust” By Getting Him Home: “It’s Refreshing” first appeared on Whiskey Riff.