Donald Trump hosted the crew of the historic Artemis II lunar flyby mission at the White House on Wednesday.
The four astronauts – commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen – joined the president in the Oval Office for a celebratory meeting and press conference.
“We’re very proud of these people. They have unbelievable courage, unbelievable a lot of other things too,” Trump said at the start of the conference, immediately segueing into praise for himself.
“To get in there, you have to be very smart, have to do a lot of things physically good. So I would have had no trouble making it, I’m physically very, very good. Maybe a little bit of a problem. We’ll have to try it.”
The crew broke Apollo 13’s distance record for the farthest distance traveled from Earth during their mission earlier this month. They reached 252,756 miles (406,771km), surpassing the 1970 record of 248,655 miles.
The mission ended off the coast of San Diego on 10 April as the Orion capsule, dubbed Integrity, made a textbook splashdown in the Pacific Ocean after its 10-day lunar odyssey.
Trump previously congratulated Nasa on the successful mission, writing on Truth Social how proud he was of the “great and very talented” crew while making no mention of his desire to impose severe cuts to the agency. Earlier this month, Trump announced his intention to slash Nasa’s budget by 23%, including a 46% cut for space science initiatives.
Discussion did not stay on the astronauts and their accomplishments for very long, quickly moving to a discussion about the supreme court’s decision from earlier today effectively gutting a major section of the Voting Rights Act.
Trump claimed that he was unaware of today’s ruling until the moment a reporter asked about it. When another journalist confirmed that the ruling was a “win for Republicans”, the president celebrated.
The court rendered ineffective section 2 of the Voting Rights Act in a 6-3 decision along partisan lines. Section 2 specifically has long been used to ensure minority voters are treated fairly in redistricting, and was the last remaining powerful provision of the 1965 civil rights law that prevents racial discrimination in voting.
“I love it, this is very good,” Trump said enthusiastically. “We can end this news conference right now. I want to read it.”
He then advised that some states should redraw their maps due to the ruling. “I know the concept of the ruling, I just haven’t seen the result,” he said. “Generally, I would think that they would want to do it. Some are greatly helped, and some, it didn’t make much difference.”
He added that the states “have time to do it” ahead of the midterm elections.
When the conference turned to the topic of current wars, the president said that the US was still in talks with Iran, though no longer will these discussions be face-to-face. “We’re not flying any more, with 18-hour flights every time we want to see a piece of paper. We’re doing it telephonically, and it’s very nice. I make a call, or I have my people make a call, and you know the answer.”
When asked by a reporter whether the war on Iran or Ukraine would end first, Trump appeared to mix up the two countries, saying: “I think Ukraine, militarily, they’re defeated,” adding: “They had 159 ships. Every ship is underwater … Every one of their planes has been shot down or has been decimated. They have missiles, about 82% are gone, and they have drones, and most of them are gone.”
Trump also said that that his administration would be releasing as much information as possible on UFOs in the near future, saying he thinks “some of it’s going to be very interesting to people”.
