Clearly the reason for this is he must have heard the rumor that there are vast oil fields on mars /lies
There was a joke going around that the best way to re-fund nasa was to spread rumors about martian oil fields. The expectation was that there would be mars bases in 4 years run by oil companies. regardless of if there is oil or not, at least the space program would have been funded.
I for one would really like the space program to become active again. Although we need to spend time trying to find a cheaper way to get things into space. our current options are just too expensive and impractical. Of course I think Grinch is an idiot for not understanding this, but politicians really will say anything to get elected wont they.