[1] On 26 April 2021, both Blue Origin and Dynetics filed formal protests with the US Government Accountability Office claiming that NASA had improperly evaluated aspects of the proposals.

[4][5] In May 2021, Sen. Cantwell, from Blue Origin's state of Washington, introduced an amendment to the "Endless Frontier Act" that directed NASA to reopen the HLS competition and select a second lander proposal, authorized spending of an additional US$10 billion.

[10][11][needs update] On 30 July 2021, the GAO rejected the protests and found that "NASA did not violate procurement law" in awarding the contract to SpaceX, who bid a much lower cost and more capable system.

[15] CNBC reported on 4 August that "Jeff Bezos' space company remains on the offensive in criticizing NASA's decision to award Elon Musk's SpaceX with the sole contract to build a vehicle to land astronauts on the moon" and that the company had produced an infographic promoting Blue Origin's design over SpaceX's design while leaving out the difference in contract bid prices.

"[24] According to Eric Berger from Ars Technica many in the space community, including some of Blue Origin's employees, reacted negatively to the company's complaint and related actions.