The entire Colorado delegation urged President Joe Biden this week to suspend any efforts to move the U.S. Space Command from Colorado Springs to Huntsville, Alabama.
The Air Force announced the move Jan. 13, near the end of Donald Trump’s presidency. U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., led the Colorado delegation in signing a letter that requests a thorough investigation into the decision by the Trump administration.
In the letter, Colorado’s delegation speculates that the decision to relocate Space Command was purely a political move. It also cites national security as a concern in the move, which would disrupt Space Command’s current operations.
Shortly after the Jan. 13 announcement, Bennet tweeted:
“The Trump Admin’s decision to move Space Command from Colorado to Alabama is bad for national security. Politics should not be involved in decisions like this.”
The letter was signed by all representatives and senators from the Colorado delegation, even ardent Trump supporters U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., and U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn, R-Colo.
In a tweet, Lamborn called the relocation “disappointing and wrong.”
In a statement on her website, Boebert said the decision “defies all common sense.”
“The threat to our security in space is real,” Boebert said in a statement. “Now is not the time to try and relocate the U.S. Space Command headquarters, especially if the reason for doing so was political.”
Colorado was home to the original U.S. Space Command from 1985 until it went inactive in 2002. It was re-established by Congress in 2018 and, in 2019, Colorado was again chosen as the designated location for Space Command, but the process in setting up the operation became stagnant.
According to the delegation’s letter, the Air Force said the creation of the Space Force was the main reason the process slowed down.
The letter says Colorado would allow Space Command to be in close proximity to other key operations and organizations such as the U.S. Northern Command, Cheyenne Mountain Air Station and the U.S. Air Force Academy, all of which are already located in Colorado.
In the letter, Colorado’s delegation also cited concerns with the possibility of losing personnel in the relocation to Alabama. According to the letter, there was a lack of transparency in how the Air Force was making its decision as to where to locate the Space Command headquarters.
The decision to move Space Command “will undermine our national security mission and our superiority in space,” the letter says.
Grace George is an intern for The Durango Herald and The Journal in Cortez and a student at American University in Washington, D.C.
