Did Biden Delay Return Of Sunita Williams And Butch Wilmore? Here's What Astronaut Says

US President Trump and Elon Musk have accused the Biden administration of delaying the return of astronauts Williams and Wilmore due to political reasons. Now, the astronauts have spoken on the issue.

File photo of astronauts Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore.

Source : PTI

US President Donald Trump and Elon Musk have accused the former government of Joe Biden of deliberately delaying the return of astronauts Sunita 'Suny' Williams and Barry 'Butch' Wilmore to Earth. The astronauts have been stuck in space for over eight months now.

A fresh clip of an interview of the astronaut duo is now going viral where Wilmore can be heard saying that Elon Musk was "absolutely factual". However, what followed only increased the confusion. Wilmore followed up the remark, saying that they were unaware of any such offer.

"I can only say that what Mr Musk says is absolutely factual. We have no information on that, though... What was offered, what was not, who was offered to, how the processes went... that's information that we simply don't have. So, I believe him. I don't know all those details and I don't think any of us can give you the answer that you are looking for," Wilmore said.

NEW: Astronaut says Elon Musk is “absolutely factual” after a WaPo reporter asked him about how Musk said his rescue efforts were denied for political reasons.

Musk was condemned by the media for making the comment but it appears the astronauts agree.

Reporter: “Elon Musk has… pic.twitter.com/Qeb8sF8gnT

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) March 6, 2025

Both the astronauts and a former NASA administrator who attended the interview stated that they had no knowledge of the purported offer from SpaceX to return them to Earth last year.

Speaking to Fox News host Sean Hannity last month, Musk insisted that he personally extended an offer to the Biden administration to bring the astronauts home ahead of schedule, only for the administration to reject it for political reasons.

A Mission That Took an Unexpected Turn

Astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita Williams arrived at the ISS on June 6, 2023, aboard Boeing’s Starliner capsule. Originally, their stay was meant to last about a week. However, Starliner suffered helium leaks and thruster malfunctions during the journey, forcing NASA to extend their time on the station while engineers assessed the spacecraft’s safety.

Ultimately, NASA deemed Starliner unfit for the return trip and decided the astronauts would instead come back aboard SpaceX’s Dragon capsule. After an extended mission, Wilmore and Williams are now set to return on March 19 — nearly nine months after launch.

Musk’s 'Offer': Fact or Fiction?

Musk and Trump have suggested that NASA’s delay in bringing the astronauts home was politically motivated. Speaking to Fox News host Sean Hannity last month, Musk claimed that SpaceX was fully capable of retrieving the crew much sooner and that the Biden administration had refused his direct offer to help.

“SpaceX could have brought them back several months ago. I OFFERED THIS DIRECTLY to the Biden administration and they refused,” Musk wrote in a social media post.

Bill Nelson, the Former NASA administrator who led the agency when decisions were being made about Wilmore and Williams'  return, also said he had no knowledge of any offer from Musk.

Nelson stressed that NASA’s top leadership spent weeks evaluating the safest return strategy, ultimately concluding that SpaceX’s Dragon capsule — rather than Boeing’s Starliner — was the best choice. However, he said the idea of an early return was never on the table. “It certainly did not come to my attention. There was no discussion of that whatsoever. Maybe he [Musk] sent a message to some lower-level person,” Nelson was quoted as saying by Washington Post.

Nelson also pointed to budgetary concerns, explaining that launching an additional SpaceX capsule specifically for the stranded astronauts would have been costly and impractical. Instead, NASA opted to allocate seats on a regularly scheduled return mission.

His comments align with those of former NASA deputy administrator Pam Melroy, who was quoted by Bloomberg News as saying, “An offer to bring the crew home early never came to headquarters.”