Ross Marchand for E21: The nation’s space program often entails sucking billions of taxpayer dollars into black holes. President Trump’s fiscal 2019 budget proposal, released Feb. 12, gives taxpayers a pleasant break from space oddities. The budget proposes the removal of government funding for the International Space Station by 2024, turning the project over to the private sector. Already this proposal is receiving criticism from some fiscal hawks blindsided by their love for federal forays into space.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, called space station privatization backers “numbskulls,” reasoning that “as a fiscal conservative … one of the dumbest things you can to is cancel programs after billions in investment when there is still serious usable life ahead.” Cruz is normally no fan of federal funding, but Texas is home to Houston’s Johnson Space Center, which oversees the space station. All politics is local.