President Trump Awards Congressional Space Medal of Honor to Artemis II Crew

On August 28, 2026, President Donald J. Trump presented the Congressional Space Medal of Honor to NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and CSA astronaut Jeremy Hansen during a ceremony at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. The award recognized their service on the Artemis II mission, which launched on April 1 and splashed down on April 10, 2026. The crew traveled 252,756 miles from Earth, farther than any humans before, and flew a total of 695,081 miles including a lunar flyby. This was the first crewed flight of NASA's SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft, named Integrity. The medal, authorized in 1969, now has 34 recipients. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman praised the crew and the agency's workforce. The mission paves the way for Artemis III in 2027 and Artemis IV in 2028, which will return astronauts to the lunar surface.