The Administration Wants to Archive Americas Orbital Traffic Control System

The Trump administration wants to freeze America's only civil orbital traffic coordination system in place — and potentially charge operators for access to it. The Commerce Department's fiscal year 2027 budget proposal, released April 21 as part of the detailed congressional justification, calls for $11 million to fund the Office of Space Commerce. That is down from $65 million in 2024, $55 million that Congress actually appropriated for FY2026, and an 83 percent reduction from the program's recent peak. But the number is not the story. The language is. "The office will containerize the beta version of TraCSS for historical reference requiring that basic space safety information be provided free of charge. That deletion clears the legal path for any successor system — or the current one under a different funding model — to charge operators for access. Taylor Jordan, director of the Office of Space Commerce, has said the administration has not committed to user fees. "It didn't say go do this," he told a conference in March. "It eliminated the words, so it gives us the flexibility to go look at that." Flexibility is the word. The administration is keeping its options open: defund the current system to near-zero, delete the free-data requirement, and see what the market will bear. The budget also proposes cutting 16 positions from the Office of Space Commerce, presumably linked to TraCSS. The office was moved from NOAA to the department's direct management in August 2025. Congress has done this before. The FY2026 budget proposed $10 million for the office with no dedicated TraCSS funding — a similar cut attempt. Appropriators restored $55 million in the final spending bill on a bipartisan basis. The question now is whether they will do it again, and whether the administration's language of "containerization" signals a willingness to accept that outcome rather than fight for the program. The orbital environment does not pause for budget negotiations. More satellites are launching this year than last year, and the year before that. Someone will be coordinating that traffic — either a government system, a commercial provider, or nobody in particular. The administration appears to be betting on the second option. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick testifies on the budget before the Senate Appropriations Committee on April 22 and the House Appropriations Committee on April 23.