WASHINGTON — As officials from several federal agencies expressed support for a White House proposal for oversight of novel space activities, the chair of a key Senate subcommittee raised concerns about it.
At a Dec. 13 hearing of the Senate Commerce Committee’s space subcommittee, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.), chair of the subcommittee, said that while she welcomed the mission authorization legislative proposal released by the National Space Council Nov. 15, there were a number of problems with it.
“I am heartened that the administration is working on this critical issue, but the proposal contains numerous ambiguities, new undefined terms and broad grants of open-ended authority,” she said.
Sinema did not elaborate on those concerns, and she left the hearing shortly after her opening statement. She did state that she had asked the National Space Council to participate in the hearing, but that the White House declined to offer someone.
The subcommittee’s ranking member, Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), also expressed disappointment that the council did not offer a witness for the hearing. He said he supported “balanced, light-tough policies that empower, not hinder, ingenuity and innovation and the get the government out of the way.”
One major criticism of the White House proposal is that it splits mission authorization between the Department of Transportation and the Department of Commerce. The Department of Transportation, through the Federal Aviation Administration, would be responsible for human spaceflight as well as in-space transportation of goods, while the Department of Commerce, through the Office of Space Commerce, would handle all other commercial space activities not currently regulated by the FAA or other agencies.
The House Science Committee advanced a bill Nov. 29 that would take a different approach, assigning mission authorization entirely to the Department of Commerce. An industry group, the Commercial…
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