WASHINGTON – President Trump told a pair of astronauts who have been stuck on the International Space Station for almost a year, “We're here to take you,” as Elon Musk appears to be preparing to launch a SpaceX capsule in about two weeks.
Trump, 78, meditated on Thursday about the possibility of personally launching rescue teams into orbit to bring astronauts Butch Wilmore and Snie Williams back to Earth.
“Biden left them there,” Trump told reporters in the oval office. “There are two astronauts stuck in space. I asked Elon, I said, “Please me. Can you put them out?” He said, “Yes.” He's ready to rise, and I think he'll be in two weeks. ”
The president said, “Biden was embarrassed by what happened and said, 'Let them be there.' You would have said, “If you're embarrassed, you have to put them out.” Elon is now preparing the ship and getting up to get them. ”
In an exchange with Fox News correspondent Peter Doucy, Trump said his message to Willmore and Williams was “We love you, we should bring you, and you shouldn't have been there that long.”
“The most incompetent president in our history has allowed it to happen to you, but this president won't let it happen,” Trump added.
“They're left there. I hope they like each other. Maybe they love each other, I don't know,” he meditated. “But they're left there. Think about it. And I see the wild hair, good, firm haired woman she has. No joke, there's no game in her hair.”
The two astronauts were stuck in June when problems were discovered at Boeing's Starliner capsule.
In September, Mask's SpaceX launched a crew dragon capsule to rescue the pair and docked it to the space station, but NASA chose to stop returning.
NASA said in December that two astronauts will have to wait for yet another SpaceX rescue vehicle to arrive for them to arrive with alternative scientists “It won't be until late March.And you will need to go through an unspecified handover period before you can finally depart.
“There's a danger there,” Trump said Thursday.
“There are some mistakes out there. It'll be very bad. You have to put them out,” he continued. “I allowed Elon a week ago, and said, 'You know, there are two people with Biden and Kamala still there.” He knows that well. I said, “Are you equipped to get them?” he said, “Yes.”
Trump then jokingly asked officials and journalists. “If you stop, you should go on that journey to board the boat.”
“If that's an option, yes,” Doucy told the president, saying he would become “the first president of the universe.”
It appears that the Trumps weren't sold.
“When they come back, will I say hello to them?” he asked.
Officials in the Biden administration have denied leaving astronauts into space for political reasons. In January, Wilmore and Williams snatched up Trump's previous claim that they were “abandoned” by their previous administration.
“We don't feel abandoned, we don't feel stuck, we don't feel stuck,” Wilmore insisted on CNN's Anderson Cooper. “I understand why others think about it.”
Williams added, “It was a little longer than expected,” but “We made the most of it.”
