The print issue of Space News confirms that Sen. Shelby (R, AL) is currently holding up the release of stimulus package money that had been approved in February for NASA. (See earlier item here.) Although the dispute is over $150M of $400M for space transport projects, he has tied up most of the entire $1B, in fact.

Back in May in a Congressional hearing, Shelby had criticized the use of $150M on commercial space transport instead of giving it to the Constellation program (see this post at Space Politics). We'll see if he can hold up the funding long enough to force the administration to re-direct the $150M back to Constellation.

The same issue of Space News has an op-ed by Robert Bigelow addressing Shelby's attack on the COTS program and SpaceX in particular: Sen. Shelby, Give Commercial a Chance.

Update: I had a chance to read Bigelow's op-ed and it includes the following:
/-- Talks about the overruns in Constellation
/-- "Constellation appears to be yet another ill-conceived NASA boondoggle suffering from all too familiar runaway costs."
/-- Talks about the serious technical problems with Ares/Orion
/-- Criticizes the reduction of Orion from 6 to 4 passengers.
/-- Gives a vigorous defense of the accomplishments of SpaceX and its potential to provide low cost launch access.
/-- Says Shelby made an error in ignoring the commercial access capabilities of the Atlas V, which is produced in Alabama.
/-- "Bigelow Aerospace has studied human-rating of the Atlas 5 and found the concept to be both viable and economically attractive."
/-- The high reliability of the Atlas V undercuts Shelby's comments about commercial launchers.
/-- "Commercial crew transport, as demonstrated by SpaceX's dramatic progress and the existing Atlas 5 launcher, represents a viable, affordable, and robust path forward."
/-- Talks about the many launch vehicle project failures at NASA.
/-- "Moreover, to hear a Republican senator espouse the virtues of a bloated, costly government program over innovative commercial concepts is so paradoxical that it requires no further comment from me."