00:00Are you ready for the event?
00:04Houston, this is Station. We are ready for the event.
00:08Well, this is a great honor.
00:10To be with you is a great honor, and I just want to thank Jessica and Neil Jack,
00:17great Americans, great patriots, brave people.
00:20I wouldn't do it, I will tell you right now.
00:22I hate to admit it. I would not want to do it.
00:25But some people love it more than anything, and you have amazing courage.
00:29And the job you've done, even to be selected, along with your fellow compatriots.
00:35You have some very good friends on board, too, from different places.
00:39And I don't know if they're hearing us, but just welcome them also.
00:44But I just want to congratulate you.
00:46And today, you know, we announced a very big thing, because we're going to do a very special academy.
00:51And whether it's West Point, Annapolis, the Coast Guard Academy,
00:56if you look at the Air Force Academy, we're going to have an academy for what you people do.
01:00Everybody in this room would be excited.
01:03And it will be at the same level.
01:04I said it has to be at the same level.
01:06If we're going to do it, it has to be at that very high level.
01:09Those are among the hardest schools to get into in the whole country.
01:12I would say almost at the top, and that's what we want.
01:16So we're going to set that up, and we'll remember this day for that.
01:20And I didn't realize that when I announced it, nobody knew about it, and the room went sort of crazy.
01:26They liked it.
01:27But we just announced it, and you probably saw it.
01:30So congratulations on that.
01:32Are you feeling well being all the way up there?
01:38Well, first of all, that is very exciting news.
01:40We are thrilled to hear it.
01:42It's the first we've heard of it as well.
01:44And we want to welcome you on board the International Space Station.
01:48We and all of our colleagues are very thrilled to have you up here today.
01:52We're all doing very well.
01:54We've been in the middle of several spacewalks, and we're getting ready for another one next week.
01:58That's very exciting, and I have a couple of people here that are very special, to two people at least.
02:05And do you want to say hello?
02:06Come on over.
02:11Hi, it's Anna.
02:12Great to see you guys up there.
02:14We love you guys.
02:15You're doing a great job.
02:19Hi, babe.
02:20Have a good time up there.
02:21We'll see you soon.
02:25It's not bad, right?
02:27How could I let them stand here and, you know, they want to say hello and you want to say
02:31hello.
02:32Who needs Trump?
02:33We want to say hello to them, right?
02:35It's an honor.
02:36This was a big day, and it's a big day actually for our country.
02:40And you have some tremendous plans.
02:42We have some tremendous plans ahead, and it's going to be something very special.
02:47I'm very proud of Space Force because they did that.
02:49It was during my term, and a lot of people didn't believe in it.
02:53A lot of people in the next administration wanted to end it.
02:56And, frankly, the military put their foot down.
02:59The military absolutely put their foot down.
03:01They wouldn't let that happen.
03:02There was almost a revolt.
03:03And now it's a part of the whole thing.
03:06A lot of the victories, when you look at Venezuela, when you look at what we've done with the drug
03:11people coming in by boat and by land, frankly,
03:15that people don't know about so much, we get all that information from space and from what the people hear
03:21and what some others are doing.
03:23So it's incredible.
03:25Incredible how important it is.
03:26Such a big deal.
03:27And it will get, with the high technology, it will get more and more with years.
03:32It will get more and more important.
03:34And so, congratulations.
03:35You're really pioneers in a true sense.
03:37They're really pioneers.
03:38And Jared certainly is a pioneer.
03:40And when I came originally, I went to Florida and looked at the Kennedy Space Center.
03:46And it was closed.
03:47It was just closed.
03:49And the runway was grass-strewn.
03:52It had grass throwing through the cracks.
03:54A lot of cracks and a lot of grass growing through.
03:56And now, when you look at it, it's like a different world.
03:59We're back.
04:00But it was sad to watch that.
04:01It was a very, very sad.
04:02It was a sad time for our country, actually.
04:05And I just congratulate everybody.
04:07And be careful.
04:08Be safe.
04:09And we love you all.
04:10Thank you very much.
04:16Thank you, sir.
04:17And I would like to say, as a colonel in the Space Force, that I am very proud to serve
04:23in the largest domain imaginable.
04:26And last week, I got the great honor of doing a spacewalk and got to look at the space station
04:32from the robotic arm and saw the incredible ingenuity that we are capable of.
04:37And I'm just so proud and excited that we are going to pave the way to our next journey to
04:44the moon, moon base, and Mars.
04:47And thank you for propelling us in that direction.
04:49We are watching your plans right now come to fruition and grateful for your leadership during this time period.
04:56Thank you for coming today.
04:57Thank you very much.
04:58Thank you very much.
05:02Would you like to say, with that beautiful mustache, I want to get a mustache, like, would you like to
05:07say something?
05:08Go ahead.
05:09Would you like to say something?
05:11Absolutely, sir.
05:12I appreciate it.
05:13Yeah, the mustache is a lot of fun.
05:14You definitely have to have one in space.
05:16It's great in microgravity.
05:19It's in the great tradition of naval aviation.
05:21And if you're going to start an academy, you know I graduated from the Naval Academy.
05:25I'm sure they're more than excited to support it and have it on board.
05:29And we're excited to be a part of the American Space Program.
05:32You're in MCC right now.
05:35Within 50, 100 feet of you are some of the finest minds that we have at NASA.
05:39And they're backed up by hundreds and thousands of more people at Johnson and Kennedy and all the centers around
05:44the country.
05:45America's leadership in the space program is incredible.
05:48We're excited about it.
05:49We're excited about going to the future.
05:51And our big team down at NASA is ready to execute and get Americans back on the surface of the
05:57moon.
05:58Thank you very much.
05:59And we'll all see you when you get back, right?
06:02We're going to see them when they get back good and safe.
06:04And God bless you all.
06:06Thank you very much.
06:12We will continue doing our best to inspire all of the bright minds of the next generation as well.
06:17We are so excited about the energy that we feel and the energy that has been kicked off by the
06:23Artemis 2 crew.
06:24Thank you for honoring them today as well.
06:27We had the pleasure of speaking to them while we were up here on the International Space Station crew to
06:31crew.
06:32And it made us all incredibly connected and incredibly proud for what we have accomplished as a country and as
06:39an international program.
06:42Great job.
06:43Very proud.
06:43We're going to see you when you get back.
06:45In fact, if you want, Oval Office time, right?
06:50It's going to be another Oval Office time.
06:52We have good luck with the Oval Office, right, Jared?
06:55So we'll see you in the Oval Office, okay?
06:57Thank you very much.
06:59Be safe.
07:00God bless you.
07:04Thank you so much for your visit.
07:05We hope you have a wonderful stay in Houston.
