President Donald Trump said Tuesday night he had asked Elon Musk's SpaceX to return two NASA astronauts from the International Space Station, who were already scheduled to fly back on a SpaceX capsule in March.

The founder of SpaceX said President Trump had asked his company to return two astronauts aboard the space station to Earth “as soon as possible.” NASA said it would do that “as soon as practical.”

NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams flew to the ISS in the summer of 2024 for a routine eight-day test mission. However, due to problems with the propulsion system of Boeing’s Starliner capsule,