The Armed Services panel (HASC) laid into Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall and Space Command head Gen. James Dickinson for Biden’s July decision to keep Space Command in Colorado.
“We don’t live in a monarchy, we live in a constitutional Republic,” said Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), chairman of HASC. “The president doesn’t just get to from high on decide this is the way it’s gonna be.”
Former President Trump revived Space Command, one of 11 combat command centers, in 2019 and designated Colorado Springs, Colo., as a temporary headquarters and Huntsville, Ala., as the permanent site.
Biden reversed that decision, choosing to remain in Colorado in order to maintain military readiness.
Dickinson said staying in Colorado “maintains our readiness at the highest levels while imposing the least disruption” to valuable employees.
Rogers said the concerns about readiness were “fabricated” and got Gen. Chance Saltzman, the chief of space operations at U.S. Space Force, to admit he previously claimed in letters to the House that relocating would not impact readiness for his forces.
And Rogers said it would cost $426 million more to build out a Space Command site in Colorado instead of Alabama.
Regardless of the motives behind the decision, the House expressed deep concerns about how messy the headquarters search has been.
Read more on what lawmakers had to say in a full report at TheHill.com.
