I want to cover a few things. First, I just want to thank President Armacost for hosting and for the leadership here at the University of North Dakota. As we talked to the students, I would ask them, where are you from? The first student that we asked, California. The next student we asked, New Jersey. Third student we asked, Michigan. Texas covered the country, and then of course a lot from North Dakota, Minnesota. But no question about it, these two gentlemen are working on things that have captured the public's imagination. They're incredibly important to the future of our country and really globally, but have really captured the imagination of the young people, and that's so good and that's so important, not only because it means support for what they're doing, but it means that these young people want to get into these careers and be part of the solution for the future. So whether it's NASA going to the moon, establishing a base on the moon, and then going from there to Mars and beyond, the public is on board, the public imagination, the fire is there, and we have of course Administrator Isaacman here. He's leading the charge. He's the right guy to do it. If you look at his background, his resume, what he has done, what he is doing, he's the right guy, right place, right time, which is what I say about you all the time at this university because it's true. But the fire is there with these young people across the country. I have no doubt about it, we're going to make it happen, and your leadership is incredible. Your willingness to be here is deeply appreciated. Also, General Gutheinz, Golden Dome is really the future. When we look at what's going on in the world today from a military standpoint, you recognize that we have to have Golden Dome. There's just no two ways about it. But the complexity involved is incredible. So same thing again, technology is running so fast. We need the best and brightest now, and we need the best and the brightest of the future to help you, General Gutheinz, make it happen. Last thing I'll say before I call on First Administrator Isaacman and then General Gutheinz, we're going to give the president the last word as he should have since we're at your house. And that is, we announced another new initiative here today at this summit here at Grand Forks. We have the finest ecosystem for unmanned aviation in the country, bar none. This is our 20th anniversary. 20th anniversary. And the reason this ecosystem is so great is because we have more partnerships than any other spot, any other place in the country when it comes to unmanned aviation and the technology behind and the development of unmanned aviation. So today we announced Project Atlas. The partners in that project are the University of North Dakota, NASA, the Department of War, and the North Dakota National Guard. And we will be developing the automation system between unmanned ground vehicle systems and unmanned aviation systems. And it kicks off next week at Camp Grafton, where they will start with selecting, with Groundbreaker, which is the selection process by the Department of War for the unmanned ground vehicle that will be used for NASA and the University of North Dakota to develop this system to combine these both air drones and automated vehicles on the ground into one integrated system that can be used for our warfighters, can be used for maintaining our bases across the country. A whole variety of uses and needs that the Department of War needs. I secured several million dollars for this effort already. I'm already working on additional funding in the defense appropriation bill for this year to continue to take that initiative forward. So I want to thank these gentlemen, both NASA Administrator Isaacman and also General Gutheinz, for all the working relationships that we have with them here in the Grand Forks ecosystem. Today's another one, and tomorrow we've got another announcement to make, which will be equally exciting. So, so great to have these gentlemen at this conference, and let me now turn to NASA Administrator Isaacman.
Thank you very much, Senator. It is an absolute pleasure to be here. What an exciting time at the world's most accomplished space agency. Artemis 2, we just sent our heroic astronauts around the moon back home safely after what I described as a brief 53-year intermission. We are returning with Artemis 3. The vehicle is already being assembled right now at the Vehicle Assembly Building. It'll witness the three most powerful rockets in the world launch in 2027 in advance of 2028 when Artemis 4 returns American astronauts to the lunar surface. We are not just going back for the flags and footprints. We are going back to stay. We are building a moon base on the lunar south pole. We are doing it for its various scientific and economic potential. But to master the skills for where we go next, which is Mars. By 2028, we will finally get America underway. Nuclear power in space. And we are launching a lot more missions of science and discovery like the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, Dragonfly, which is our uncrewed aerial system that just happens to be going to Saturn's moon of Titan. Not to mention rebuilding our X-plane portfolio, which it seemed like for a school with deep aviation history that got a lot of the students really excited. And I just have to say, it's all about appreciation at this point. It would be utterly impossible for NASA to be able to compete in this space race that we are very much in right now without Senator Hoeven's leadership in Congress, without the historic investment in NASA that came through the Working Family Tax Cut Act, we would not be able to venture out farther what is the ultimate high ground of space, without General and the guardians in the United States Space Force. And we can't do any of this without the best and brightest talent from across the nation. And North Dakota is no exception. And especially here at this academic institution where today we had opportunities to witness the students, not to mention their professors that are testing out habitation and actually long-duration 14-week habitation profiles that are helping build the spacesuits that our future astronauts, hopefully many of them graduating from this school, will require when they're walking on the lunar surface or perhaps even walking on Mars someday. Not to mention all the other great pioneering work across aviation and air traffic management, especially in a future that will undoubtedly have millions of drones operating inside our national airspace from pharmaceutical to other delivery applications and of course I'm sure contributing to national security applications as well. So it's a real honor to be here. I'm very grateful and thank you for the time, Senator.
That's right. Okay, General Gutheinz, you're next.
Hey, good afternoon. Hey, what a great day in the great state of North Dakota. And you may be wondering why is Golden Dome in North Dakota and what is Golden Dome all about. Golden Dome is about securing the prosperity of this nation well into the future. In order to do that, we're going to need partnerships, and we've got a great partnership with the state of North Dakota, with the two senators from North Dakota, with the industry partners here in North Dakota, as well as the University of North Dakota. And today it was exciting to see the energy and the passion coming out of the students across all domains. Whether that be in business, whether that be in arts, whether that be in physics, engineering, or even in the sciences, because that passion, that energy is what we need to tap into to secure our future and our prosperity. They are a very innovative bunch, a very excited bunch, very engaged bunch. It's been great to get out of the National Capital Region and come back to the heartland and just to see the energy that is coming out of North Dakota and the innovation. So, thank you very much. It's been a great day. Senator, thank you for inviting me here. It has been exceptional, and President, thank you very much.
Words of wisdom before we go to some questions.
Just to offer my thanks on behalf of the entire University of North Dakota for these three great leaders. So what we heard today was a vision, an appreciation for the technology and the needs of our nation to protect itself and to keep moving forward into the future. And I'm really grateful for them taking the time to come to campus to hear from our faculty, our staff, and most importantly our students. And if you were in the session earlier, you heard their genius comments matched by the genius questions that were asked to them by the students today. I was so proud to be the president of the University of North Dakota. Thank you.
And you should be. I mean, any of the young people that got up and asked questions, you know, I said, 'Okay, please tell us what year in school you are, what you're studying, and where you're from.' And every one of them got up and it's like incredible. I mean, I just, I was impressed with all of them. Okay, fire away. Question. Question for you. And by the way, welcome back to North Dakota. You're pretty close to residency. I'm sure he was in the dorm not long ago, right, with you, Senator, and been here a few times. So, we appreciate you. Welcome back. You've talked about the no-risk, slow-moving culture being a thing of the past. Speak specifically to this project that was announced and the university's role in that, Grand Sky, the whole infrastructure ecosystem here. What you see coming out of that.
Yes. If you look at the last several generations, we've optimized our industrial base for efficiency. And why is that? That was because the threat was far off. The threat was on the other side of the oceans and we were not being threatened here on the homeland. What we see every day on our televisions is that's no longer the case. We are at risk and we've got to rapidly change that equation. In order to rapidly change the equation, we got to change the way we do business. That means our old processes of optimizing for efficiency, being risk-averse, being process-centric, moving at a slow pace are not going to get us where we got to get to protect the nation at large. So, we've got to change the way we do business. A lot of that changing the way we do business is partnering and collaborating more with industry, with academia, with other government agencies like we've never done before. And coming back to North Dakota is really about that partnership and building that partnership and tapping into that innovation both within industry and especially within academia and saying, 'Hey, how do we solve the nation's toughest problems together at a pace to get after this threat?' You want to take anything on that, Administrator? Any else?
This one's for all three of you. So we've spent a lot of time today talking about great power competition. You know, the threat that China poses in the space domain, but I wanted to get your thoughts on what the role of our allies is in the increasingly contested domain of space.
That's a good one. I would just say I'll start it out. In general, our allies need to join with us and they need to do more. That's my opinion. Go ahead.
Yeah, I've said many times when NASA, we undertake and achieve the near impossible, we never go at it alone. And for sure it takes contributions from across the nation. There are things that our national labs contribute. There's our industrial base, you know, some of the companies that were around during the first Apollo era like Boeing and Northrop Grumman are still part of our programs today. And then you have your new companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin and kind of bring a different flare and set of capabilities to it. But it also takes the contributions of our international partners. I mean, we have the European Service Module that's on the SLS rocket. Now, the message that we've given is that given the reality of the space race that's in today, the contributions that are needed are those that help accelerate the mission outcomes, right? And in the past, it wasn't always the case. In the past, it was at times because it was absent global competition. Let's collect a lot of flags in the press release and all come together. Whatever you can bring will be welcome. It doesn't work that way anymore. We are going to do things in a way that help us achieve our goals: return astronauts to the moon, build a moon base, and do so as quickly, safely, and affordably as we can. And the good news is the international community is responding incredibly well. President Trump created the Artemis Accords during his first term. There's over 76 nations that have contributed now. More than half showed up for our moon base announcement to talk about what they could do to contribute to building out the moon base. So I think we're headed in a good direction right now where we can contribute and achieve hard things with our international partners.
