The Dayton Daily News reports today that retired Air Force general Lester Lyles has removed his name from consideration for the NASA administrator job. Lyles, in Dayton for a meeting of a company on whose board of directors he serves, said that it would be “too big a financial penalty” for him and his family to take the job. Doing so would have required him to divest himself of stock holdings and end service on various corporate boards. Lyles said he was the administration’s “top candidate” for the job and that the White House had made additional appeals to try to convince him to take the job.
While getting official word from Lyles himself is useful (especially if he indeed was the administrator’s top choice to run the agency), it’s not surprising that he isn’t taking the job, since it was clear over a month ago that he didn’t appear that interested because of financial concerns. And so the search goes on…
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