Roy Blunt: “those of us who have had a chance over some time now to work with the former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, know…”

“those of us who have had a chance over some time now to work with the former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, know that he is a man of ideas and is often thinking well beyond the moment. I had a chance the other day to read a paper that he prepared on President Trump's Moon-Mars Development Project, and I want to borrow heavily from his thinking as I talk about this project today. It is an important time. We just spent significant time remembering, appreciating, and looking back at the 50th anniversary of American astronauts landing on the Moon and returning safely. Fifty years goes more quickly than you might think. But for the first time in that 50 years, we are really at a point where there is a chance that we could cease to be the leading power in space. We decided we were going to become the leading power in space; we became the leading power in space; we have been the leading power in space. But that is not necessarily a given, and you can last only so long living on your past accomplishments. President Trump, on the Fourth of July, made this comment: ``I want you to know that we are going to be back on the moon very soon, and someday soon we will plant an American flag on Mars.'' My guess is that was received with sort of the same amount of skepticism as President Kennedy's challenge was more than 50 years ago. There is no question that the Artemis Project that President Trump is talking about is not the Apollo Project 50 years later.…”