4/7/25: The Atomic Bomb Set the Stage for the College Funding Fight (Bloomberg) How did the nation’s elite research universities end up in such an exquisitely vulnerable position? While some blame “woke” campus culture, the roots of this clash go back some 80-plus years, when the US first called on scientists for the Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb. That historical moment paved the way for unprecedented federal aid — yet also set schools up for the current crisis. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2025-04-07/the-manhattan-project-set-the-stage-for-trump-s-college-funding-fallout?srnd=phx-opinion&embedded-checkout=true
4/6/25: Don’t overlook the continued threat of cuts to universities’ indirect research costs (Stat, Opinion, AAU President Barbara Snyder) Imagine that one evening you go out to a neighborhood restaurant and order a steak dinner. It is delicious, and everything is going well — until the check comes, and you demand that the proprietor knock the price down by a third. https://www.statnews.com/2025/04/07/indirect-costs-facilitities-administration-nih-cuts-universities/
See also: Federal judge issues permanent injunction on Trump cuts to research overhead payments (STAT). https://www.statnews.com/2025/04/04/nih-indirect-costs-federal-permanent-injunction/
See also: Surprise! White House asks for ‘permanent’ block on NIH’s sudden indirect cost cap (Science) https://www.science.org/content/article/indirect-cost-surprise-nih-lawsuits-kennedys-mistakes-trump-tracker
4/6/25: Trump Is Going After Universities’ Federal Funding. Here’s What to Know. (Wall Street Journal) While many faculty members argue universities shouldn’t yield to Trump, they are in a tricky spot. It isn’t uncommon for a quarter or more of the operating budget of a large university to come from federal sources in the forms of student loans, Pell Grants and research funding—research that supporters say goes on to produce innovations and fuel the broader economy. https://www.wsj.com/us-news/education/trump-college-university-funding-7a3b7dc4
4/6/25: How Princeton University is navigating the loss of federal funding (NPR, Podcast with Transcript, President of Princeton University) https://www.npr.org/2025/04/06/nx-s1-5351515/how-princeton-university-is-navigating-the-loss-of-federal-funding
See also: Princeton’s US grants frozen, follows Trump actions against other schools (Reuters) https://www.reuters.com/world/us/princeton-says-us-grants-frozen-follows-trump-administration-moves-against-other-2025-04-01/
4/6/25: Biotech start-ups struggle as Trump throttles NIH funding (Washington Post) The Trump administration’s deep rollbacks on medical research funding are eroding a key pillar of the American biotechnology industry, weakening a financial bridge that helps scientists translate laboratory discoveries into therapies that benefit patients. https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/04/06/nih-funding-biotech-startups/
4/5/25: Obama calls on citizens, colleges and law firms to resist Trump agenda (Washington Post) Obama called for universities to be prepared to lose government funding to defend academic freedom and other core values, or dip into their endowments — though endowments are sometimes funded with restrictions from donors on how that money can be spent. “If you are a university, you may have to figure out, are we in fact doing things right? Have we in fact violated our own values, our own code, violated the law in some fashion?” he said. “If not, and you’re just being intimidated, well, you should be able to say, that’s why we got this big endowment.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/04/05/obama-trump-universities-intimidation/
4/4/25: NSF Implementation of Executive Orders New FAQs & Updates:
- Update: My proposal received a favorable determination last calendar year. When can I expect a decision about its eligibility for award?
- A. Questions about proposals that have been recommended but not yet awarded should be directed to the assigned program officer listed on the proposal status screen in gov .
- New: How do the executive orders affect the NSF Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR) or submitters from EPSCoR jurisdictions?
- A. NSF EPSCoR continues to operate as described in the program’s funding announcements. At this time, awardees should continue activities consistent with the current terms and conditions of their NSF EPSCoR award(s). NSF continues its overall commitment to increase investments in EPSCoR jurisdictions. Submissions from EPSCoR jurisdictions to NSF EPSCoR and other NSF funding opportunities are encouraged.
- New: Are project reports for currently awarded projects still being reviewed, and is NSF issuing funding increments for continuing grants?
- A. Project reports are being reviewed, and NSF is issuing funding increments.
- New: Am I allowed to hire postdocs and research assistants on my current award? Can I still train students?
- A. Activities are permitted to proceed in accordance with the approved budget and terms and conditions of your award. If you have other questions about your award, please contact the cognizant grants officer listed in the award notice.
4/4/25: Trump Presents Harvard With an Ultimatum for Federal Funds (Inside Higher Ed) The Trump administration presented Harvard University with a letter Thursday outlining “immediate next steps” the institution must take in order to have a “continued financial relationship with the United States government… If the case follows the precedent set at other universities, Harvard and its affiliate medical institutions could lose up to $9 billion in federal grants and contracts if they do not comply. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/politics-elections/2025/04/04/trump-sets-demands-harvard-must-meet-regain-federal
See also: Trump Demands Harvard Eradicate DEI to Preserve Its Federal Funding (The Chronicle) https://www.chronicle.com/article/trump-demands-harvard-eradicate-dei-to-preserve-its-federal-funding
See also: I Led Harvard’s Medical School, and I Fear for What’s to Come (New York Times, Guest Essay) https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/04/opinion/harvard-medicine-higher-education.html
See also: With Universities Threatened, Can Boston Still Be Boston? (New York Times) https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/06/us/boston-trump-harvard-university-funding.html
4/4/25: Brown University to see half a billion in federal funding halted by Trump administration (NBC Boston) The Trump administration is planning to halt more than half a billion dollars in contracts and grants awarded to Brown University, adding to a list of Ivy League colleges that have had their federal money threatened as a result of their responses to antisemitism, a White House official said Thursday. Nearly $510 million in federal contracts and grants are on the line, said the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the plan and spoke on condition of anonymity. https://www.nbcboston.com/news/local/brown-university-to-see-half-a-billion-in-federal-funding-halted-by-trump-administration/3676356/
4/4/25: Tariffs hit science labs: Trump levies raise cost of supplies (Nature) The Trump administration’s sweeping tariffs on imports into the United States — which range from 10% on products from some countries up to 54% on goods from China — are increasing the costs of labware and specialist scientific instruments in the country. The price increases come as research budgets for US labs are stretched thin by unprecedented grant cancellations and cuts to university funding introduced since Donald Trump’s second presidency began in January. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-01060-9
4/4/25: Colleges Must Stand Together to Resist Trump (The Chronicle, Opinion) The reason higher education has not offered a coordinated response to the administration’s attacks is that it is not designed to do so…Over the past two centuries, competitive fragmentation and plurality of purpose have benefited higher education too much for it to pay the high cost of coordination and coalition. Faced with challenges positive and negative — explosive growth in the 1940s and 1950s, student protest in the 1960s, public defunding in the 1980s — our disconnected system has proved resilient… Today’s challenges require a new, more coordinated approach. https://www.chronicle.com/article/colleges-must-stand-together-to-resist-trump
See also: How are college presidents handling funding threats? Preparing for the worst (NPR) https://www.npr.org/2025/04/04/nx-s1-5349444/college-presidents-trump-threats-funding
4/4/25: Trump NIH Blocked From Cuts to Research Funds, Plans Appeal (Bloomberg Law) The Trump administration was blocked from capping funds from the National Institutes of Health that cover grant recipients’ research overhead costs, a federal judge ruled Friday. States and academic groups showed success on the merits of their argument that the NIH violated the Administrative Procedure Act when it issued a 15% cap on “indirect funds” in February, Judge Angel Kelley of the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts ruled . https://news.bloomberglaw.com/pharma-and-life-sciences/trump-nih-blocked-from-cuts-to-research-funds-plans-appeal
4/4/25: HHS Cuts Impacting Human Subject Research – No More SACHRP? (Holland & Knight) In a remarkable federal human subject research policy development, it appears that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Human Research Protections (SACHRP) has been disbanded. Formed in 2003, SACHRP was a federal advisory committee whose expert volunteers advised government agencies that regulate human subject research. https://www.hklaw.com/en/insights/publications/2025/04/hhs-cuts-impacting-human-subject-research-no-more-sachrp
4/4/25: 16 States Sue to Restore N.I.H. Funding (New York Times) California, Massachusetts and 14 other states sued the Trump administration on Friday for withholding grant funding from public health and medical research institutions, cuts that have forced universities to curtail research and to delay the hiring of new staff. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/04/us/politics/trump-nih-lawsuit.html
4/4/25: NIH prepares to launch new research into autism causes, a Trump priority (Washington Post) NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya and other officials are weighing a public competition intended to jump-start research or to pursue a more traditional grant approach. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/04/04/autism-vaccines-nih-research-trump/
4/4/25: International PhD students make emergency plans in fear of US immigration raids (Nature) A wave of shock and fear has spread among university researchers as US immigration officials have moved to detain and deport international students and scholars. The officials allege, in many instances, that the detainees’ involvement in protests against Israel’s war in Gaza constitutes a threat to national security. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-01056-5
See also: GOP senators back crackdown on foreign students (The Hill) https://thehill.com/homenews/education/5232526-republicans-trump-crackdown-foreign-students-campus-protests-rubio-cruz-tuberville/
4/4/25: Trump White House releases guidance for AI use, acquisition in government (FedScoop) Both memos, which are dated April 3, represent some of the first major policy actions President Donald Trump has taken on the government’s use of AI….The first new memo (M-25-21 ) provides guardrails for use and replaces Biden’s directive on the same topic (M-24-10 )…. Similarly, the second memo on AI acquisition (M-25-22 ) replaces the Biden OMB’s guidance on government purchasing of the tech (M-24-18 ). https://fedscoop.com/trump-white-house-ai-use-acquisition-guidance-government/
4/3/25: Trump will ask Congress to rubber-stamp his funding cuts, a top OMB official says (Politico) President Donald Trump will be sending Congress a package of funding to nix and expects enough Republicans to vote for it, according to the acting chief of staff for the White House budget office. https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/04/03/congress/trump-will-ask-congress-to-rubber-stamp-his-funding-cuts-a-top-omb-official-says-00269592
4/3/25: We Are in the Crossfire for Just Doing Our Jobs (The Chronicle) The Chronicle surveyed 3,844 respondents at two- and four-year colleges in the United States between March 5 and March 20, asking whether they’d recommend their work to others, how their institution has responded to federal actions, and whether they felt free to express their opinions. Here’s what they said. https://www.chronicle.com/article/higher-ed-employees-say-the-sector-is-less-attractive-under-trump
