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2/26/25: The NSF’s Higher Ed Research ‘Hit List’ (Inside Higher Ed) Senator Ted Cruz has released a database of more than 3,400 National Science Foundation grants he believes push “a far-left ideology.” Free speech advocates and researchers say it’s a scare tactic that undermines scientific inquiry. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/science-research-policy/2025/02/26/nsfs-higher-ed-research-hit-list#
2/26/25: Universities feel ripple effects of DOGE cuts to health (Axios) As the battle over Elon Musk’s DOGE-directed cuts to federal medical research continues, institutions already are freezing hiring, cutting back on the number of Ph.D. students they’ll accept and making other contingencies. https://www.axios.com/2025/02/26/musk-doge-science-cuts-universities-fallout
2/26/25: NIH turmoil sparks anxiety over future of its global grants (Nature) The policy developments “cast a shadow across future planning”, especially for international collaborations involving interdisciplinary research, says Scott, whose grant looks at how the brain of the zebrafish (Danio rerio) processes visual and auditory information. The NIH has “a very generous and outward-looking policy” of funding researchers overseas, grounded in a philosophy of expanding knowledge and advancing medical research, he says. “The uncertainty that arises for international researchers is whether the NIH will consider continuing to send money overseas.” https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-00595-1
2/26/25: The Department of Education Threatens to Pull the Plug on Colleges (The New York Times) The Department of Education issued a threatening letter this month addressed to all educational institutions that receive federal funds. The letter offers an extreme and implausible interpretation of the law governing diversity, equity and inclusion policy. It demands that schools abandon not just affirmative-action-like programs that consider the race of individuals but also policies that are blind to individuals’ race if those policies were adopted, even in part, to promote racial diversity. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/26/opinion/education-department-dei.html?searchResultPosition=2
2/25/25: A Mystery Solved: Amy Gleason, a Former Health Care Executive, Is Running DOGE
(New York Times) For two weeks, the Trump administration had resisted answering inquiries about who was formally leading the effort, which reports to the White House. Mr. Musk, who is the world’s richest man and a key adviser to President Trump, has been clearly driving the initiative…But the White House has insisted in court that Mr. Musk is not the administrator of the cost-cutting team, adding to the sense of opacity surrounding it. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/25/us/politics/amy-gleason-doge-administrator.html
See also: Who is Amy Gleason, the person named DOGE’s acting administrator by the White House? (AP News) https://apnews.com/article/doge-acting-administrator-amy-gleason-65af638e646fdd5dd6d5fcc5cc04a2e7
2/25/25: House approves ‘big, beautiful bill’ budget after wild whip effort (Politico) The vote went almost entirely along party lines, 217-215, with every Democrat voting against the measure and only GOP Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky joining them. Adopting the budget measure is a key step toward passing the “big, beautiful bill” that Trump and Johnson have called for — one that includes border security, tax and energy provisions that the president campaigned on. https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/25/house-budget-republican-agenda-00206125
2/25/25: NIH Funding Cuts Could Have Ripple Effects on College-Town Economies (The Chronicle) Deep cuts in federal research spending could reverberate beyond campuses, denting college-town economies and costing jobs outside academe. An analysis suggests that a cap on overhead costs for research funded by the National Institutes of Health would cause a $6.1-billion hit to the overall economy, as well as a $4.6-billion reduction in labor income. https://www.chronicle.com/article/nih-funding-cuts-could-have-ripple-effects-on-college-town-economies
2/25/25: What academic research could learn from college athletics (STAT, Opinion) https://www.statnews.com/2025/02/25/academic-research-bayh-dole-act-indirect-costs-athletics/
2/25/25: Why the Government Historically Has, and Still Should, Pay For University Research Costs (Time Magazine) Universities needed to recruit the best minds, build modern facilities, and decrease the time scientists spent teaching so they could prioritize research. Failure to do so, Bush argued, would push talented researchers into private industry. There they might contribute to the growth of the postwar economy rather than address urgent intellectual questions. Drug discovery, desalinization technology, and the development of artificial intelligence were all innovations that both challenged the limits of the human condition and served the nation’s strategic interests and therefore required its best minds. https://time.com/7259548/why-government-should-pay-for-university-research-costs/
See also: A Compromise on University Funding (Wall Street Journal, Opinion) https://www.wsj.com/opinion/higher-ed-needs-to-compromise-with-gop-national-institute-of-health-cost-cap-297a780b?st=YpMtgb&reflink=article_copyURL_share
2/25/25: Trump blocked from imposing sweeping federal funding freeze (Reuters) A U.S. judge on Tuesday extended an order blocking President Donald Trump ‘s administration from instituting a sweeping freeze on trillions of dollars in federal funding by pausing grants, loans and other financial support. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-blocked-imposing-sweeping-federal-funding-freeze-2025-02-25/
See also: Judge Cites ‘Chaos’ in Blocking Trump’s Grant-Funding Freeze (1) (Bloomberg News) https://news.bloomberglaw.com/litigation/judge-cites-chaos-in-blocking-trumps-grant-funding-freeze-1
2/25/25: Colleges Restrict Graduate Student Admissions After NIH Proposes Rate Cut (Inside Higher Ed) The disruption to graduate school admissions is the latest cost-cutting move for colleges. After the National Institutes of Health proposed cutting reimbursements for costs related to research, several colleges and universities said they would pause hiring and cut spending, Inside Higher Ed previously reported . (A federal judge has blocked the NIH plan from taking effect for now.) https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/science-research-policy/2025/02/25/facing-nih-cuts-colleges-restrict-grad-student
2/25/25: Daily briefing: Postdocs and PhD students hit hard by Trump’s crackdown on science (Nature) As US federal grants remain frozen and budget cuts loom, a nxiety and fear grip early-career researchers. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-00550-0
2/24/25: Come together, right now (Science, H. Holden Thorp, Editorial) Many science faculty members at universities still do not see the actions of science leaders as sufficient. But a full-on “resistance” posture by universities and associations is unlikely given the scale of their responsibilities. My plea to my academic colleagues in this time is to trust that science’s leaders are making the best judgments they can about how to proceed, remembering that timing can be everything. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adw9972
2/24/25: Gov. DeSantis establishes Florida version of DOGE, will cut positions, audit universities (Tallahassee Democrat) Gov. Ron DeSantis announced a Florida version of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), following the federal government’s steps to eliminate “waste, fraud and abuse” but on the state level. https://www.tallahassee.com/story/news/local/state/2025/02/24/desantis-starts-florida-doge-to-look-at-job-cuts-university-audits/80021362007/
2/24/25: Medical research labs brace for possible funding cuts that could disrupt their work (NPR) A Trump administration plan to change how the National Institutes of Health pays for medical research at universities and other institutions has sent shock waves through labs around the country. https://www.npr.org/2025/02/24/nx-s1-5307157/trump-nih-funding-cut-medical-research
2/22/25: Accessibility Initiatives Are Taking a Hit Across the Sciences (New York Times) Confusion has ensued about the future of programs and research supporting people with disabilities as a result of President Trump’s executive order. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/22/science/trump-accessibility-research.html
