COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – Ohio politicians hope the state catches President Joe Biden’s eye as the next home for the U.S. Space Command – but they may be reaching for the stars.
As the Biden administration continues what has become a politicized search for the Space Command’s headquarters, elected officials at the local, state and federal levels want Ohio – specifically its Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton – to be the No. 1 choice.
“Our vision is that Ohio becomes a global leader in aviation, aerospace,” state Rep. Adam Holmes (R-Nashport) told fellow lawmakers Tuesday morning.
But the Air Force appears to have different plans. In an email Tuesday afternoon, a department spokesperson said Ohio didn’t make the shortlist for Space Command’s headquarters, which is currently stationed in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
The Air Force is looking at six locations for Space Command, including former President Donald Trump’s original choice as announced in 2021: Redstone Arsenal, a U.S. Army post in Huntsville, Alabama, the department spokesperson said. Other “reasonable alternatives” include:
- Albuquerque, New Mexico
- Bellevue, Nebraska
- Cape Canaveral, Florida
- Colorado Springs, Colorado
- San Antonio, Texas
Although the spokesperson said Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall is poised to make a final decision soon, Ohio elected officials are still gunning for the honor, holding onto hope that the Biden administration reconsiders its plans.
“Ohio has an extraordinary legacy in aviation, innovation and ingenuity, from the Wright brothers to John Glenn,” said Keary McCarthy, executive director of the Ohio Mayors Alliance. “We think that history, combined with some of the existing capacity we have here in Ohio … we just have a lot to offer when it comes to relocating our U.S. Space Force Command.”
Two state lawmakers, Rep. Brian Lampton (R-Beavercreek) and Tom Patton (R-Strongsville), recently introduced a resolution urging the federal government to bring Space Command to Ohio, specifically the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where infrastructure is already equipped to house such military headquarters.
As part of their plea, they invited two experts in the field of space exploration to speak before a House committee Tuesday, including Dr. James A. Kenyon, director of the state’s NASA Glenn Research Center.
“There’s gonna be a race to the moon, quite frankly, and making sure that we stay ahead of that is going to be important,” Kenyon said.
Leaders at the local level also jumped on board, largely at the inspiration of U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, who took to the Senate floor in early June to call for Space Command’s relocation to Ohio. In a letter to Biden and top Air Force officials, the Ohio Mayor’s Alliance – a bipartisan group of mayors from the state’s 30 largest cities – signaled its support for a Space Command move to Ohio.
“Ohio’s cities both in the Dayton and southwest Ohio area as well as the rest of the state are ready, willing, and able to invest in education, housing, and employing Space Force families and all of its related suppliers and services,” the letter read.
And the financial benefits of housing Space Command would be extraordinary, McCarthy said. As Kenyon told state lawmakers, NASA’s Glenn Research Center rakes in $2.5 billion for Ohio’s economy alone and employs about 11,000 people.
“Those bring jobs, those bring high-paying jobs, those bring new people to the state of Ohio,” McCarthy said. “They have just tremendous economic impacts that would benefit not just our cities, but the statewide economy as a whole.”
Kendall is expected to announce a decision soon, but a department spokesperson did not elaborate on a specific timeline. A spokesperson for the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base declined to comment.
