President Donald Trump’s “one big beautiful bill” extends the life of a flagship NASA program he once dismissed as “grossly expensive and delayed.” His expected signature Friday would be an about-face worth potentially billions of dollars to north Alabama’s space economy.

Moving Discovery was the goal of legislation brought earlier this year by Texas Republican Sens. Ted Cruz and John Cornyn, who said in April that Houston's long ties to the space program should have been recognized with a space shuttle when four were retired by NASA in 2010.