Astronaut Stranded in Space for 9 Months Tells Fox News He’s ‘Grateful’ for Trump, Musk: ‘They Have Earned My Trust’
NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore expressed gratitude to President Donald Trump and Elon Musk during an interview with Fox News’ Bill Hemmer that aired on America’s Newsroom Monday morning.
The two set out for the International Space Station last June for a stay that was supposed to take a few days. Both were marooned aboard the ISS after their Boeing Starliner capsule was deemed unsafe to bring them home.
They finally touched back down on solid ground on March 18 after Musk’s SpaceX sent a crew to bring them back.
In their first public interview since returning home from the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston, Willaims and Wilmore sat down with Hemmer to discuss their extended stay in space.
They said in Monday’s interview they were grateful to Trump and Musk for facilitating their return.
At one point during the interview, Hemmer asked them, “What would you like to say to President Trump and Elon Musk?” Wilmore replied:
I respect you. I trust you. You’ve given me no reason not to trust you, either one of them. What they say, I can’t say what they say. I haven’t lived that. But 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 is hugely important global significance and they take an active role and based on the past and what we see now with them doing that it’s refreshing – not just refreshing – it’s empowering. It’s strengthening for our nation I think it’s a good thing for our nation when the national leaders especially something that’s high visibility are involved in the process and I’m grateful for that.
Williams responded:
I’m just glad that they’re involved and they take notice. And, our situation, I think I mentioned before, maybe wasn’t the perfect situation, but allowed a lot of people, including the President and Elon, to look at what’s going on on the International Space Station, take it very seriously and understand that our involvement as a country, as a spacefaring nation, is really important throughout the world. And it sets an example and it shows. you know, our ability to be able to do the hard things, put people in space, operate in space work in space and then bring us back. It’s important and I appreciate that them and many, many, many more people took notice of it.
Trump and Musk both have accused former President Joe Biden of abandoning the pair in space. Williams and Wilmore told CNN last month they never felt “abandoned” on the ISS.
Watch above via Fox News.
