{"id":1015557,"date":"2026-08-21T19:54:22","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T19:54:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1015557\/"},"modified":"2026-08-21T19:54:22","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T19:54:22","slug":"trump-to-honor-artemis-ii-crew-with-nations-top-space-medal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1015557\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump to honor Artemis II crew with nation&#8217;s top space medal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>President Trump plans to award the Congressional Space Medal of Honor to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/astronauts-nasa-moon-mission-artemis-ii\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">the crew<\/a> of NASA&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/live-updates\/nasa-artemis-ii-launch\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Artemis II mission<\/a>, CBS News has learned.<\/p>\n<p>A White House official confirmed the award will be presented Friday, Aug. 28, at Johnson Space Center in Houston.<\/p>\n<p>NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, along with Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, became the first humans to travel <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/live-updates\/artemis-moon-lunar-flyby\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">around the moon<\/a> in more than a half-century during a 10-day mission. They <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/live-updates\/artemis-ii-splashdown-return\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">splashed down<\/a> safely to end the record-breaking flight on April 10.<\/p>\n<p>      <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/gettyimages-2271711331.jpg#.jpeg\" alt=\"Artemis II astronauts  \" height=\"413\" width=\"620\" class=\" lazyload\"  loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p>                  Artemis II astronauts Jeremy Hansen, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Reid Wiseman in Houston on April 16, 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>                Raquel Natalicchio\/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Only 30 astronauts have received the medal, including Neil Armstrong and John Glenn,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nasa.gov\/history\/congressional-space-medal-of-honor\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">according to NASA<\/a>. Astronauts killed in the Apollo 1 fire and the space shuttle Challenger and Columbia disasters received the medal posthumously.<\/p>\n<p>The last astronauts awarded the medal were Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken, who in 2020 became the first to launch to orbit on a commercial spacecraft. President Joe Biden awarded them the medal in 2023.<\/p>\n<p>Despite its name, the medal is awarded by the president based on recommendations from the NASA administrator. Congress has authorized the president to present, in the name of Congress, a medal to any astronaut who has &#8220;distinguished himself by exceptionally meritorious efforts and contributions to the welfare of the Nation and of mankind,&#8221; according to NASA.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Editor&#8217;s note:<\/strong> The location of the award ceremony has been updated based on new information from the White House.<\/p>\n<p>\n              Go deeper with The Free Press\n            <\/p>\n<p class=\"content__tags__label\">In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Trump plans to award the Congressional Space Medal of Honor to the crew of NASA&#8217;s Artemis II&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1015558,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[24],"tags":[264582,32475,69,916,159,783,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-1015557","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-artemis-program","tag-astronaut","tag-donald-trump","tag-nasa","tag-science","tag-space","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117135257475485094","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1015557","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1015557"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1015557\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1015558"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1015557"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1015557"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1015557"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}