SpaceX and Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) CEO Elon Musk’s close aide, Jared Isaacman, who was earlier nominated and then snubbed for the NASA administrator job by President Donald Trump over previous political ties, is reportedly a top candidate for the job after meeting with key White House officials, including Trump.

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Former Air Force Officer Also In Consideration

Isaacman met with Trump multiple times in recent weeks, according to a post shared by Florida’s Voice Assistant Editor Eric Daugherty on Thursday.

Isaacman’s bid for the administrator job was also reported by Bloomberg on Thursday, which also said that Retired US Air Force Lieutenant General Joseph Guastella, an executive with Northrop Grumman Corp (NYSE:NOC), is also being considered for the position.

Guastella shares a close relationship with General Dan “Razin” Caine, a close Trump ally, the report said. Both candidates have met with U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, who was appointed by Trump as NASA’s Interim Administrator in July.

NASA’s Renewed Mars Push?

Isaacman’s nomination could signal a more Mars-centric approach for NASA. Isaacman had earlier reiterated the importance of human missions to Mars. “We will prioritize sending American astronauts to Mars,” Isaacman had said during a Senate hearing earlier this year.

Interestingly, Musk recently said that making the plans of colonizing Mars a reality would require 100K humans and 1 million tons of cargo to be shipped to the Red Planet. Musk has touted SpaceX’s Starship as a crucial element to the billionaire’s Mars ambitions.

NASA will also send probes to Mars on board Jeff Bezos-backed commercial space flight company Blue Origin’s New Glenn Rocket as part of the ESCAPADE (Escape and Plasma Acceleration Dynamics Explorers) mission, which will study the Red Planet’s interactions with Solar Winds. The probes are built by Rocket Lab Corp (NASDAQ:RKLB).

Bezos also sounded out his space ambitions, outlining that humans could be living in space in the near future, adding that people would choose to live there out of desire and not necessity.

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