In an address from the White House on Tuesday afternoon, President Donald Trump announced that the United States Space Command (USSPACECOM) headquarters will be heading to Alabama. It is the latest chapter in a multi-year fight that has seen both Colorado and Alabama battling to become the host for the unified combatant command, which is responsible for all military operations in outer space, specifically those operations 100 km (62 miles) and greater above mean sea level.
USSPACECOM achieved full operational capability in December 2023, becoming the 11th and newest command after being reestablished on August 29, 2019. Trump had signed an order in 2018 that reestablished USSPACECOM, after it had been absorbed into the U.S. Strategic Command in 2002.
During Trump’s first term, it was announced that USSPACECOM would be headquartered in Huntsville, AL. However, in 2023, President Joe Biden announced that it would remain at its temporary headquarters at Peterson Space Force Base (SFB) in Colorado Springs, CO.
“The U.S. Space Command headquarters will move to the beautiful locale of a place called Huntsville, Alabama, forever to be known from this point forward as Rocket City,” Trump told reporters Tuesday.
Huntsville Has Been the ‘Rocket City’ Since the 1950s
As the Huntsville Convention & Visitors Bureau explains, anyone who drives into the city on I-565 will pass a 363-foot-tall rocket that is visible from miles away.
“Clear, folks here like their rockets,” the HCVB website explains, but it added that Huntsville earned the moniker “Rocket City” in the early 1950s. Until that point, the city of just over 16,000 people was “proud” to call itself the Watercress Capital of the World. However, it was transformed when Wernher von Braun, who had headed Nazi Germany’s rocket team during the Second World War, set up shop at the Redstone Arsenal, where he led the United States’ rocket team.
Von Braun was one of several former Nazis who came to the United States after World War II as part of the then little-known “Operation Paperclip,” which sought to utilize their expertise to help kick-start America’s rocket development and the subsequent space program. The Redstone Arsenal became the foundation for the NASA Marshal Space Flight Center in 1960, but the nickname “Rocket City” was first used by the Huntsville Chamber of Commerce in 1953.
USSPACECOM To Head to the Heart of Dixie
The Redstone Arsenal was initially selected as the preferred final location for USSPACECOM, edging out Kirtland Air Force Base, Offutt Air Force Base, Joint Base San Antonio, and Patrick Space Force Base, as well as its interim location at Peterson Air Force Base.
However, almost immediately after it was announced, there was pushback from lawmakers in Colorado and New Mexico. The Biden administration announced that USSPACECOM would remain in the Centennial State, citing advice from several military commanders, who argued that uprooting the command would interfere with space operations.
As of this year, around 64% of USSPACECOM’s personnel were located in Colorado.
Alabama’s Rep. Mike Rogers and Senator Tommy Tuberville had been vocal about relocating the command to Huntsville. After the 2024 election, they predicted it was a matter of when, not if, such an announcement could be made.
It has been argued that politics has played a role, with Trump favoring Alabama, but some officials have said that it isn’t simply a partisan issue, even as the former Space Command’s headquarters was located at the then-Peterson Air Force Base (AFB) from 1985 to 2002.
A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report from May 2025 quoted USSPACECOM officials who said they had “faced ongoing personnel, facilities, and communications challenges” in Colorado.
“This will result in more than 30,000 Alabama jobs,” Trump said. “And probably much more than that, and hundreds of millions of dollars of investment. … Most importantly, this decision will help America defend and dominate the high frontier, as they call it.”
Numerous defense contractors, including Boeing, L3Harris, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman, have facilities in both states. However, lawmakers in Colorado have vowed to continue to fight the move to Alabama.
