NASA is globally famous for its space missions, but it seems like the government agency doesn’t only deal with rockets and astronauts at present. Under the second presidential reign of Donald Trump, NASA appears to have been reclassified as a national intelligence as well as a security agency, which can be perceived as something entirely different from its primary status.
However, the change of status wasn’t as loud as a directive, issued late last month, quietly changed the functions of the agency to include “intelligence, counterintelligence, investigative, or national security work.” The revelation wasn’t much noisy on the first hand as mentioned; however, a former NASA scientist, as well as the founder of the NASA Watch, Keith Cowing, brought the news to public attention.
🚨 Breaking Executive Order placing NASA Labor Force under National Security Work.
👀 Is this about Labor or 3I/Atlas ?
The order states the listed entities “are hereby determined to have as a primary function intelligence, counterintelligence, investigative, or national… pic.twitter.com/jRcZZ52YpW
— Mav (@Mavmetax) August 30, 2025
Now the question arises – will NASA move forward and trade spacecraft for spycraft? Though that is not the case here, as reports says the changes will be significant and circle around labor rights here on Earth and won’t hamper missions in space, and stuff. The order brings NASA under the (FSLMRS) – Federal Service Labour-Management Relations Statute, which restricts it from collective bargaining protections. The workforce of the organization reflects on its union representation, which is its shield against unfair treatment, which could possibly vanish.
“The Trump administration issued an executive order late last month, quietly declaring that NASA will operate as a national intelligence and security agency going forward.” Trump is destroying America Science and our universities. We have to… #America #Science #universities pic.twitter.com/v8PI3Zjbz6
— ProgressivePower (@OurProgressive) September 17, 2025
And people are not lagging behind to protest, as earlier this week, the employees of the organization gathered outside the agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., to protest this decision. This move is reportedly a broader effort, executed by the Trump administration, to strip thousands of federal employees of union rights. Sources also say that lawsuits are piling up in an attempt to block the order.
The Vice President of the Goddard Engineers, Scientists, and Technicians Association, Monica Gorman, came to the protest and reflected on the stakes, saying, “A huge part of the reason that I have that independence, and that my colleagues do, is that as a union-represented worker I know that I am protected from unfair retaliation,” According to Wion News.
Nevertheless, the angle of “NASA-as-a-spy-agency” has been able to get into people’s skin and has captured public imagination, even if the immediate consequences are really about labor battles.
The shake-up comes on top of brutal budget news. On May 2, Trump proposed slashing NASA’s 2026 budget by nearly 25 percent — dropping it from $24.8 billion to $18.8 billion. That’s the lowest funding level since 1961, and most of the cuts target NASA’s science programs. Trump’s focus, however, seems clear: less on Earth science, more on militarizing space. His administration is pushing the so-called “Golden Dome” missile defense program, while pressuring NASA to prioritize a crewed Moon mission before China plants its flag.
Sean Duffy, NASA’s acting chief, confirmed Trump’s ambitions during a press conference: the administration wants astronauts on the Moon and eventually Mars. Just last month, Duffy bluntly declared that NASA will drop “all of these Earth sciences.” Even so, he promised the Artemis mission was still alive — though he admitted fears that China could beat the U.S. there.
