Blue Origin Announces Tron’s Justin Sun as Passenger for 34th New Shepard Mission
Private space technology company Blue Origin, founded by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, has revealed that TRON co-founder Justin Sun will join its next suborbital rocket mission aboard the New Shepard vehicle.
Led by CEO and founder Jeff Bezos, Blue Origin confirmed via a Monday announcement that Sun is set for the upcoming 34th crewed flight (New Shepard NS-34), expected to launch within weeks. Reports indicate Sun placed a $28 million bid for the first seat on the mission.
Promoted by the company as potentially personally chosen by Sun, the remaining five crew members were reportedly drawn from “the TRON DAO community” — a group including holders of TRX, BTT, JST, SUN, NFT, and WIN tokens. Blue Origin cited this community composition on a previous notice issued in 2021, stemming from a general promotion encouraging TRON community members seeking a “Blue Origins crew seat” to respond with their airline miles. A spokesperson for Sun corrected this narrative, explicitly stating Sun did not select the crew but identified “long-term holders” among investors, a businessman, a journalist, and a venture capitalist as his nominees.
Buildings on the Blue Origin Launch Site adjacent to Bezos’ Blue Valley ranch are receiving final preparations for lift-off, with the launch window scheduled for the soonest flight timeframe reported by the company.
This mission follows Blue Origin’s high-profile April 2024 flight, aboard New Shepard NS-32, which sent an all-women crew into suborbital space, including entertainers and news personalities.
Tron Founder and Unconventional Ties to Trump Administration
Since March 2024, Sun has cultivated ongoing associations within the Trump orbit, including being met by Ivanka and Jared Kushner near the White House after endorsing J.D. Vance in the Indiana Senate primary.
These connections come at a critical time for the TRON founder, who maintains significant stakes in ventures supporting President Donald Trump’s perceived crypto ambitions.
Sun’s holdings through TRON Treasury Inc. (a corporate body originally affiliated with crypto platform OKX) reportedly include substantial quantities of “Official Trump” (TRUMP), the non-profit-backed memecoins facilitating access to White House programs and exclusive benefits.
Sun invested $30 million in World Liberty Financial (WLF), Mr. Trump’s crypto platform, in October 2023 and again invested a reported $75 million total — including a $100 million card-acceptance acquisition agreement signed July 20, 2024 — formerly linked crypto assets in readiness for the December 2024 transition.
On July 9, 2024, Eric Trump referred to the TRON co-founder as a “great friend” during remarks at an “Investor Summit” hosted by WLF.
Sun additionally purchased vast quantities of former TRUMP coin leading up to a May 2024 White House “crowdsourcing event,” an effort reaching the magnum opus designations from which $100 million purchases grant “priority access.”
A significant complication for this profile emerged when the SEC filed a 258-page lawsuit in July 2023 alleging Sun violated securities laws through “manipulative trading, and unlawful touting of crypto asset securities,” specifically referencing conduct dating back to 2021.
Under a Trump-appointed acting SEC Chair designate Mark Uyeda, the agency and the defendant jointly filed a motion seeking to stay (suspend) the case. The U.S. District Court granted the motion on October 20, 2024, following an evidentiary hearing on October 6, effectively halting further public legal discovery in the case.
