One of the astronauts who was stranded on the International Space Station (ISS) has said some of the blame for what went wrong lies with him.

Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams splashed down off the coast of Florida earlier this month after more than nine months onboard the ISS.

The two astronauts docked at the ISS on 5 June last year, expecting to be there for just eight days.

Instead, issues with Boeing’s long-awaited Starliner meant NASA decided to leave them waiting in orbit for months.

Wilmore: ‘Start with me’ for blame

Mr Wilmore was asked at a NASA news conference on Monday evening where he lays the blame for the issues with Starliner, to which he said, “I’ll start with me”.

“There were issues, of course, with what happened with Starliner,” he added. “There were some issues, of course, that happened that prevented us from returning on Starliner.

“And I’ll start with me because there were questions that, as the commander of the spacecraft that I should have asked. And I did not, I didn’t know I needed to…

“Blame, that’s a term – I don’t like that term – certainly there’s responsibility throughout all the programmes, and certainly you can start with me.”

He then added that responsibility for the issues with returning home can be found “all throughout the chain”, including with NASA and Boeing.

Williams: ‘Life goes on up there’

Ms Williams also said she was somewhat surprised by the interest in their prolonged space mission.

“Life goes on up there. I mentioned today that we pivoted and became [ISS] crew members,” she said. “You maybe sort of get tunnel visioned into doing your job.

“We were just really focused on what we were doing… ‘the world doesn’t revolve around us but we revolve around it’.”

Ms Williams then said: “I don’t think we were aware to the degree [people were interested], pretty honoured and humbled by the fact of when we came home, it was like ‘wow there are a lot of people’.”

During their long wait in space, the two US navy veterans completed spacewalks, experiments and even helped sort out the plumbing onboard the ISS.

Sky’s science and technology editor Tom Clarke asked the astronauts if the politics around their stay in the ISS made a difficult situation worse. Nick Hague – who also was onboard the Crew-9 flight – disagreed.

After explaining the timeline from the launch of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 to the return of the two astronauts, he said: “That was never in question the entire time.

“The politics don’t make it up there when we’re making operational decisions. There were a lot of options that were discussed, and the team on the ground… is gigantic, and everyone was working with a singular focus.”

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Astronauts more guarded answers show NASA giving politics a wide berth

Tom Clarke

Science and technology editor

@t0mclark3

The life of an astronaut is all about preparation.

And as Butch and Suni faced questions for the first back on Earth time about how their “stranding” in space was treated like an orbital political football – that really shone through.

The astronauts looked healthy and relaxed, despite having spent 35 times longer in space than they had expected to.

They were happy to answer questions about their safe return, the effects of their extended stay in space on their bodies.

But when it came to politics, the answers were much more guarded.

When I asked them about whether politics had made their difficult situation worse, it was quickly picked up, not by the pair themselves, but by astronaut Nick Hague, their mission commander for the ride back to Earth.

“The politics don’t make it up there when we’re making operational decisions,” he said.

“There were a lot of options discussed by the ground team, and everyone worked with singular focus on how do we end the Crew 9 mission at the right time and maintain the safety and the success of the space station mission.”

Their reluctance to address the political questions around the mission is understandable.

They have returned to a NASA bracing itself, like many federally funded organisations, for possible budget cuts and the mercurial decision-making of Donald Trump and his close ally Elon Musk.

Both men had suggested it was a political decision by the previous administration not to return them to Earth sooner.

Painting their already scheduled return as a “rescue mission” – despite presenting no evidence of the claim it put NASA in an embarrassing position.

It has been maintained all along that the plan was for the pair to return to Earth with the next rotation of the space station crew. Which is what subsequently happened.

But in the current political climate, and still awaiting the confirmation of a new leader for NASA’s administration, it’s giving politics a wide berth.

The crew were also asked about how weird it was to return to Earth in the SpaceX capsule – and about the welcome party of dolphins that swam around the vessel after splashdown.

“I can tell you that returning from space to Earth through the atmosphere inside of a 3000-degree fireball of plasma is weird, regardless of how you look at it,” Mr Wilmore said.

“It’s thrilling, it’s amazing, I remember thinking about the structure of the capsule,” as the Dragon Freedom capsule descended at pace toward our planet.

“And then the parachutes open and… it’s exhilarating.”

Mr Hague then remarked, “I had requested dolphins as kind of a joke”.

The president of Finland says Donald Trump is running out of patience with Vladimir Putin and is frustrated with him.

The Finnish leader spoke to Sky News after spending the day with the US president and playing golf with him.

Alexander Stubb said Donald Trump is “the only person who can broker a peace, a ceasefire, because he’s the only one that Putin is afraid of” – but is tiring of the Russian leader’s tactics.

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“There was a combination of impatience and a tad of frustration,” he said during their match in Florida over the weekend – and it wasn’t with his golf swing.

“We were talking a lot about the ceasefire and the frustrations he had that Russia was not committing to it.”

Mr Stubb’s comments confirm reports of a change in attitude by Mr Trump over the Russian leader.

He has until recently seemed more than happy to give Putin the benefit of the doubt, applying enormous pressure on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy instead.

Putin’s refusal to accept a 30-day ceasefire though is changing that, according to the Finnish leader.

He said: “If there was a pendulum of trust and distrust, certainly Russian activity in the past few weeks has proven that we’re moving more towards the distrust side of things.”

Mr Stubb is urging the imposition of colossal sanctions on Russia if it does not accept the ceasefire by a deadline that he says should be set for Easter.

The US is considering sanctions on Russian oil, he said. “Oil, oil prices, serious caps on oil.”

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Republican senator Lindsey Graham, who also played golf with Mr Stubb on Saturday, is proposing what he has called “bone breaking sanctions” if it does not comply with ceasefire demands.

Sanctions failed to deter Russia from invading Ukraine in the first place or reverse its invasion since.

But Mr Stubb insists Russia’s economic pain is now reaching a critical point and sanctions could tip it over the brink.

He said: “You never underestimate the capacity of Russians to live through discomfort. I mean that’s what the Soviet Union was really about. But at the same time, there has to be a wall at some stage. And I think that wall is approaching.”

If Donald Trump is losing patience with Russia, is he prepared to do anything about it?

“I think we need a colossal amount of sanctions on 20 April if the Russians don’t abide by the ceasefire,” said Mr Stubb.

But is Donald Trump’s Finnish golfing partner confident he is going to apply that pressure?

“Fairly confident,’ he said. “More confident than hopeful.”

It may take more than that to persuade Putin there is something to really worry about.

Donald Trump is one of two presidents to serve two non-consecutive terms, second only to Grover Cleveland, who did it in the 1800s.

But Mr Trump has made comments hinting at a third term in office.

An amendment to the Constitution, which is the supreme law of the United States, prohibits anyone from serving for more than two terms.

But what has the president said, how likely is he to pursue a third term in 2028 – and is it even possible?

Has a third term been done before?

Franklin Roosevelt served as US president four times from 1933 to 1945, because there was nothing in the original US Constitution that limited how many terms a president could serve.

But later the 22nd amendment limited presidents to two four-year terms, irrespective of whether they were served consecutively or not.

Congress passed the 22nd amendment two years after Roosevelt’s death and it took effect from the 1952 election.

No one has been able to serve more than two terms since.

The amendment states “no person shall be elected to the office of the president more than twice”.

What has Trump said?

The president made his most direct comments yet about seeking a third term in an interview with Sky News’ US partner NBC News on Sunday 30 March.

When asked about the possibility, he said: “A lot of people want me to do it. But, I mean, I basically tell them we have a long way to go, you know, it’s very early in the administration.

“I’m focused on the current,” he added.

When asked whether he wanted another term, the president responded, “I like working.”

“I’m not joking,” Mr Trump said, when asked to clarify. “But I’m not – it is far too early to think about it.”

When asked whether he has been presented with plans to allow him to seek a third term, Mr Trump said, there are “methods which you could do it”.

NBC News asked about a possible scenario in which vice president JD Vance would run for office and then pass the role to Mr Trump. Mr Trump responded that “that’s one” method.

“But there are others, too,” he added.

Asked to share another method, he simply responded “no.”

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Some of Mr Trump’s allies have been vocal in their support for him pursuing a third term.

Steve Bannon, a former Trump strategist who runs the right-wing War Room podcast, called for the president to run again during a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference last month, adding in a later interview with News Nation that he believed the president would “run and win again in 2028”.

Republican congressman Andy Ogles crafted a resolution calling for the extension of presidential term limits, which would allow Trump to seek another term in office.

Could Trump do it if he wanted to?

It would be “virtually impossible”, retired Commonwealth Court judge Joseph Cosgrove tells Sky News.

He would have to amend the Constitution to do it, which Mr Cosgrove says is an “arduous task”.

“The usual method requires two-thirds of both the House and Senate to propose an amendment, which would then require three-fourths of the states to approve,” he explains.

“Given the extremely close political divisions in the United States, neither of these events is foreseeable. Even if the Republicans control both the House and Senate, their majority will be so slim that no revision of the 22nd amendment could ever occur in this climate.”

Mr Fortier, who agreed with Mr Cosgrove’s points, says some legal scholars have suggested there are loopholes that could be exploited to get around the two-term limit.

“They argue that the 22nd amendment prohibits someone from running for a third term [but] not from serving a third term,” he says.

“And by an ingenious trick, a term-limited president could be elected to the vice presidency or placed in the line of succession and then ascend to the presidency when those ahead of him in the line of succession resign.”

This is the method Mr Trump alluded to, in which Mr Vance would be elected president in 2028 with Mr Trump as his vice president, before switching positions.

Mr Fortier says that this theory, however, ignores a number of other amendments and other constitutional laws which indicate that a vice president or someone else in the line of succession “must meet the qualifications to become president”.

And Mr Trump, or someone else who has already served two terms as president, would not meet that criteria thanks to the 22nd amendment.

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Additionally, Derek Muller, a professor of election law at Notre Dame, notes the 12th amendment, which was ratified in 1804, says “no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of president shall be eligible to that of vice-president of the United States.”

This means that because Mr Trump is not able to be president in 2028, he also cannot be vice president, Prof Muller explains.

“I don’t think there’s any ‘one weird trick’ to getting around presidential term limits,” he continues, adding that pursuing a third term would require extraordinary acceptance by federal and state officials, not to mention the courts and voters themselves.

He suggested Mr Trump is talking about a third term for political reasons to “show as much strength as possible” rather than with the intention of running again.

“A lame-duck president like Donald Trump has every incentive in the world to make it seem like he’s not a lame duck,” he said.

Democratic congressman Daniel Goldman, who served as lead counsel for Mr Trump’s first impeachment, said in a statement: “This is yet another escalation in his clear effort to take over the government and dismantle our democracy.

“If Congressional Republicans believe in the Constitution, they will go on the record opposing Trump’s ambitions for a third term.”

What has the president said in the past?

It was in the lead-up to the 2020 election, which Mr Trump lost to Joe Biden, that he first started hinting at seeking a third term.

At a rally in August 2020, he told supporters he would win the next election and then possibly “go for another four years” because “they spied on my campaign”, an apparent nod to his unsubstantiated claims that Barack Obama had his “wires tapped” before he was elected in 2016.

According to Forbes, Mr Trump told another rally that if he were to win the 2020 election, he would “negotiate” a third term, adding he was “probably entitled to another four [years] after that” based on “the way we were treated”.

But in an interview in 2023 with NBC News, Mr Trump was asked if there was any scenario in which he would seek a third term should he win the presidency next year, to which he responded: “No.”

And in April 2024 he told Time magazine he “wouldn’t be in favour” of an extended term – but two vague comments he made in speeches last year stoked rumours he could try it.

One was during a National Rifle Association speech, when he asked supporters if he would be considered “three-term or two-term” – though this appeared to be in reference to his unsubstantiated claims that he should have won the 2020 election but that it was rigged against him.

Another came in July, when he told attendees at a conservative Christian event they wouldn’t “have to vote anymore” if he won the 2024 election, according to CBS News.

After repeatedly telling them to vote “just this time”, he added: “In four years, you don’t have to vote again. We’ll have it fixed so good, you’re not going to have to vote.”

John Fortier, senior research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, says the comments from the Christian event have been taken out of context, and that Mr Trump was simply trying to “encourage the sometimes reluctant Christian community to vote in this election”.

“Trump in office would be able to address their concerns so much so that it would not matter if they chose to vote in future elections,” he explains.

“It was not an indication that Trump would cancel future elections or try to serve beyond his second term.”