European Space Agency reveals 3 key space missions threatened by Trump's NASA budget cuts
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.
The European Space Agency (ESA) has revealed that three of the 19 missions it is planning or operating in collaboration with NASA are at risk as a result of President Trump's proposed budget cuts, which could slash finances available to the U.S space agency by 24%.
During a press conference held on Thursday (June 12), ESA Director of Science Carole Mundell revealed that the space-based gravitational wave observatory LISA, the Venus orbiter EnVision, and the largest X-ray observatory ever planned, NewAthena, could be threatened if the proposed NASA budget cuts in Trump's FY26 budget go ahead.
ESA thinks that at this initial stage, the impact can be mitigated on the other 16 missions in collaboration with NASA, but the remaining three missions may require a rethink if they happen at all. "We're looking at three potential missions that, should the budget proposal come to pass as written, would require recovery actions. That's LISA, EnVision, the NewAthena," Mundell said.
ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher added: "This is an ongoing negotiation in the United States. It is not for us as ESA to comment on these negotiations or to interfere, but we are impacted in quite a number of domains that are, at least at the moment, proposed for cancellations or reductions.
"This will require that some of the activities may be frozen. No decisions or cancellations have yet been made because the decisions on the side of the U.S. are not yet finalized. We need to wait for the final decisions from the U.S."
Mundell continued by underlining how deeply ESA values the collaboration between Europe and NASA, but added that Europe does have or could acquire the technical capabilities to reduce to reproduce missing elements.
"That's something that we're now working through," she added.The number of missions that could be threatened if ESA is forced to repurpose funds extends beyond the three missions mentioned above.
Though the Nov. 16, 2025 launch of the sea-level rise monitoring Sentinel-6B spacecraft will go ahead as planned, its sibling mission, Sentinel-6C, could also be impacted by the proposed budget cuts if they are passed successfully.
"It was my proposal when I was director of Earth observation, to rename a satellite Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich [after former director of the Earth Science Division in the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters from 2006 to 2019]," Aschbacher added. "It would be a pity if Sentinel-6C were not funded or supported, as it is a successor of the mission Michael Freilich, which is still in space. We offered our satellite to be named after a NASA Administrator as a very visible sign of the of the deepness of the cooperation between NASA and ESA."
Proposed U.S. budget cuts could also impact the planned Mars rover Rosalind Franklin, previously known as the ExoMars rover. That is because the robotic explorer named after the esteemed British chemist was set to feature several components supplied by NASA.
ESA may now seek to develop on its own the technologies for the three main elements of the rover set to be provided by NASA: its launcher, radio isotope heater unit, and aerobraking engine. This will take time and may impact the mission's timeline, which would have seen Rosalind Franklin head to Mars in 2028.
Related Stories:
— Trump administration proposes slashing NASA budget by 24%
— Experts alarmed as White House proposes 'largest single-year cut to NASA in American history'
— Trump's 2026 budget plan would cancel NASA's Mars Sample Return mission. Experts say that's a 'major step back'
Of course, nothing is yet set in stone, with the U.S. Congress yet to have the final say on how to allocate federal dollars. A final decision on the FY 2026 Discretionary Budget is expected in Fall 2025. Meanwhile, ESA will meet in late November to finalize its own budget. This means that the space agency may have to move ahead with contingency planning and budgeting before the final outcome of proposed U.S. budget cuts is known.
"The timing is expected to be maybe just before decisions are being made, and the fiscal year 26 budget will be known for sure. We need to assess on one side, how much it costs to wait, and how long we can wait," Aschbacher said. "There is a lot of analysis and options that need to be verified and need to be discussed."In brief, the main highlight, or the main point, is that we have agreed to make sure that Europe is increasing its resilience and autonomy to make sure that we have the technologies we need in the near future."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Bloomberg
19 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
Stocks Rattled Ahead of Big Options Test
Get a jump start on the US trading day with Matt Miller, Katie Greifeld and Sonali Basak on "Bloomberg Open Interest." SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son is seeking to team up with TSMC on a trillion-dollar industrial complex in Arizona to build robots and AI. President Trump signals he would give diplomacy a chance before deciding whether to strike Iran. And Bezel Co-Founder & CEO Quaid Walker joins Bloomberg Open Interest to talk about the luxury watch market. (Source: Bloomberg)
Bloomberg
19 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
SoftBank's Founder Pitches $1 Trillion US AI Hub
Jordan Klein, Managing Director at Mizuho Securities USA, says Masayoshi Son's pitch for a $1 trillion AI and robotics hub in Arizona is a marketing ploy. He explains why he thinks that on 'Bloomberg Tech.' (Source: Bloomberg)
CBS News
19 minutes ago
- CBS News
When will we know the NYC mayoral primary election winner?
New York City voters are casting their ballots in the primary election for a Democratic mayoral nominee, and many are wondering when we will know who won -- and how ranked choice voting will impact the results, and their timing. Early voting wraps up this weekend, and Election Day is next Tuesday, June 24. Are we going to get results on primary night? We will see unofficial first choice results after polls close at 9 p.m., but that's not the end of the story, considering ranked choice voting. Those unofficial first choice results will include those marked as first choice from early voting, Election Day, and valid mail-in ballots. If, however, no candidate goes over 50% of the vote - and considering the large number of candidates running in this race, that seems very likely - we will then move into ranked choice elimination rounds. Under the system, the candidate who got the fewest first-round votes will then be eliminated, and voters who ranked that candidate first on their ballots will then have their second choice candidate counted. That process will then repeat until one candidate exceeds 50% of the vote. So when will we get a clear picture of the winner? We will likely start to get a clearer picture of the winner before official results are certified. Preliminary, non-certified results will come out a week after the election. We can then expect weekly reports, as elimination rounds are conducted. The entire process could take up to several weeks. In the last mayoral primary -- the first citywide election with ranked choice voting -- the final results were certified nearly a month after the election.. At a certain point, a presumed winner may start to emerge. For example, if a candidate is approaching 50% of the vote, and the gap between that candidate's unofficial numbers and their nearest competitor is greater than the number of ballots still needing to be counted, then that person will almost certainly become the winner. The final, certified results still won't come out until all ballots are counted, including early voting, mail-in, absentee, military, affidavit and emergency ballots.
