Free astronomy festival begins this Sunday, June 14th in Pasadena! Build a comet, see the Sun up close, watch gravitational wave demos, catch talks on black holes, exoplanets, asteroids, and more! The Planetary Society is joining Caltech, JPL, Carnegie, and more at the City of Astronomy Science Festival, and it's free for everyone. Starting event: 📅 June 14 🕐 1–5 PM 📍 Pasadena Convention Center Learn more about all the events: cityofastronomy.org/astrofes…

Artemis III is the next step in NASA’s plan to bring humankind back to the Moon. Here's everything you need to know ⬇️ planetary.org/articles/what-…

Humans just flew around the Moon for the first time in 50 years. So what comes next and are we actually ready for it? This month's Planetary Report goes deep on the physiology of long-duration spaceflight, the policy forces shaping human exploration, and the technology bridging Apollo to Artemis. Download the PDF version for free: planetary.org/planetary-repo…

We built this interactive dashboard as a side-by-side "track changes" comparison for the proposed OMB rules. At hundreds of pages of dense regulatory text, we show exactly what the current rules say versus what the proposed rules would change, section by section, across all 399 affected provisions. dashboards.planetary.org/rul…

Do you still have questions about the OMB's proposed rule? This month's episode of Space Policy Edition podcast with Casey Dreier features Elizabeth Ginexi, and they work through the proposed rules changes to federal grantmaking that would suppress, isolate, and set back American science. Listen here: planetary.org/planetary-radi…

We've created a simple guide for the professional scientific community on how OMB's proposed grant-making rules affect your work. These rules would give political appointees control over grant funding decisions, reduce peer review to advisory status only, and allow active grants to be terminated without justification. Access it here: planetary.s3.amazonaws.com/a…

The White House’s Office of Management and Budget just proposed new rules that would let political appointees, not scientists, decide which research gets funded in the United States. Under these rules, a senior political official would have to personally approve every single federal grant before it goes out. Peer review, which has been the gold standard for evaluating science on merit, would be reduced to just a suggestion. And if your research falls out of political favor? Any active grant can be revoked at any time, with no explanation required. We're talking about NASA grants, NSF grants, the funding that powers discoveries about our Universe and our planet. This rule was not written by NASA's leadership, and it works against the agency's own exploration goals for the Moon, Mars, and beyond. The rules would also ban entire categories of research outright, and cut off collaboration with scientists from other countries, even if those researchers live in the U.S. Researchers wouldn't even be able to use grant money to publish their findings or attend scientific conferences without getting special permission first. This affects everyone from PhD students to career scientists to all of us whose lives improve because of federally funded research. The public comment period is open right now, but this time, we're not asking you to sign a form letter. We need your actual words, your story, to make a difference. Identical submissions get counted as a single comment, so the more you write, the less OMB can ignore us. We cannot stress how dangerous this rule would be if enacted. But we can stop this if enough people submit their personal story of why peer-reviewed science is important. The deadline to submit comments is July 13th. planetary.org/advocacy-actio…

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman announced a major reorganization of NASA. Learn more about what that looks like ⬇️ planetary.org/save-nasa-scie…

The House budget bill that includes NASA funding just cleared a key hurdle, advancing out of the Appropriations Committee. This is the first funding bill for FY 2027 to be released and reach this stage, establishing congressional intent and rejecting the worst of the Office of Management and Budget’s proposed cuts to NASA. planetary.org/articles/house…

The U.S. Department of War has released classified UAP files but how do we figure if they're real? planetary.org/articles/are-u…

This is one of our favorite kinds of events to host. We're gathering members virtually in our Community app on May 20 to watch "Small Town Universe" an award-winning documentary about the people of Green Bank, West Virginia, a town inside a federally designated radio quiet zone where residents voluntarily give up their cellphones and most electronics to protect the world's largest steerable radio telescope. After the film, director Katie Dellamaggiore joins us for a conversation, along with a special guest who plays a central role in the story. Mat Kaplan former Planetary Radio host, will guide the conversation! It's a members-only event, and if you're not a member yet, this is a great reason to become one. Membership starts at just $4/month. 📅 Wednesday, May 20 • 6:00 – 8:30pm MDT Become a member: planetary.org/membership

On April 24, all 22 members of the National Science Board were dismissed in an unprecedented action that strips the @NSF of the independent oversight Congress has required by law since 1950. This comes after a year of damage to NSF: more than 30% of staff lost, headquarters surrendered, new grants issued at a quarter of the historical pace, and two OMB proposals to cut NSF's budget by more than half. Tell your members of Congress to use the FY 2027 budget and their oversight power to ensure independent oversight of NSF. ➡️ planetary.org/advocacy-actio…

Congratulations to our Chief of Space Policy, Casey Dreier, and Director of Government Relations, @JackKiraly, on receiving the 2026 Harold Masursky Award for Meritorious Service to Planetary Science, presented by the Division for Planetary Sciences of the @AAS_Office. 🎉 This award recognizes outstanding service to planetary science and exploration — and there's no better example of that than their work advocating for NASA science funding. Learn more about the award here: dps.aas.org/news/aas-divisio…

When astronauts, unions, advocates, and the broader space community speak with one voice, Congress listens. We joined @Astros4America , @AAS_Office, @UCSusa, and 20 organizations in sending a joint letter to Congress: reject the proposed 46% cut ($3.4 billion) to NASA's Science Mission Directorate. If enacted, this proposal would terminate more than 50 missions and eliminate 2,000 civil service positions. It would be the smallest inflation-adjusted NASA science budget since 1984. The space community is united in opposing it. And early signs suggest Congress is listening. The House has already moved to hold NASA's topline flat, and the Senate looks to follow. Read the letter in full: planetary.s3.amazonaws.com/a…

Is it Venus? Jupiter? Mars? Use our night sky guide to figure out what you're actually looking at for the month of May ➡️ planetary.org/night-sky/nigh…

Back at it with✨SCIENCE✨

Oh, will you look at that. These are real images of Earth, captured by NASA's Landsat satellites. The website is going viral right now because you can spell your name using individual satellite images that resemble letters. We used the tool to spell out this message — can you tell what it says? And the program that made it possible? Funded by the Science Mission Directorate that's now facing a 46% cut. Try it yourself: science.nasa.gov/specials/yo…