HOUSTON, TX — If Jared Isaacman’s 15-year-old self could see him now, he’d scoff: “Thaaat’s bullshit.”
That’s what 43-year-old Isaacman, who is the administrator of NASA, told me—and if you look at his biography, it’s easy to see what he means. Isaacman is a billionaire who, after dropping out of high school in New Jersey, built a credit card processing company that’s now valued at nearly $3.5 billion. In his early 20s, he earned his pilot’s license. In his late 20s, he started another business—this time a defense company, which uses its fleet of privately owned fighter jets to train the U.S. Army for aerial combat.
But what Isaacman had always dreamed of being was an astronaut—ever since he was a toddler, and his eldest brother brought home a telescope. “I remember in kindergarten, holding a picture book of the Space Shuttle and telling my teacher that I was going to be an astronaut someday,” he told me. “And I remember her saying: ‘I’ll be sitting in my rocking chair watching when it happens.’ ”
In his late 30s, it happened. His first company, Shift4, powers the payment system for SpaceX’s internet service, Starlink, and Isaacman said that at the end of a business call with them he made an offhand remark about how much he dreamed of going to space. That’s how he ended up financing and commanding two SpaceX missions. With the first, Inspiration4, he raised more than $240 million for St. Jude Children’s Hospital. Three years later, he commanded a second, Polaris Dawn—and became the first civilian ever to walk in space, using a brand-new, lightweight space suit.
