Jared Isaacman

You know, when I was at Draken, and again, our job was to be the bad guy.

And I watched as years went by and what we were replicating or attempting to replicate in terms of the Chinese threat was getting better and better and better.

And it was getting scary.

And we would sit around.

I mean, this is like seven, eight years ago, long before I went to space, you know, and you're at the bar talking, you're like, this is going to be a problem, right guys?

And it's like, I remember saying, it was probably a handful of beers deep in the conversation.

I was like, you know what?

They're going to get back to the moon before us, and it's going to be a wake-up call, and they're going to have congressional hearings, and we are going to—all these things that we allowed to happen, you know, the over-consolidation in the defense industry that has killed innovation, that makes things cost way too much for the warfighters and come too little too late, like, it's going to fix all of that.

And I was, you know, I wouldn't, as an American, I don't want to see that happen.

I care about the competitiveness in the nation.

But I was like, maybe that's what it's going to take until I got nominated to lead NASA.

And I was like, hell no, like, we're not going to let that happen.

But I mean, there's a chance it could.

And if it does, you know, maybe it'll be the, you know, maybe it'll be the wake up call we need.

I don't know.

In a heartbeat.

In a heartbeat.

I mean...

Like, I have no, I didn't.

Hey, the honor is mine, really.