---
title: "Science policy of the second Trump administration"
chunk: 2/3
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_policy_of_the_second_Trump_administration"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:18:18.766303+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

The Trump administration ordered a suspension of National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant funding on January 27, which froze much of its $47 billion budget. The order was blocked by courts after legal challenges but continued when the government exploited a loophole in which they refused to publish the agency's meeting plans in the Federal Register. The NIH announced on February 7 that it would cap support for indirect costs in grants to institutions at 15% of a grant's value. Indirect costs cover expenses that are not directly related to research but are necessary to support it, such as rent for facilities, utilities like heat and electricity, or janitorial and administrative staff. Indirect costs typically range from 30% to 70%, and the cuts represent "tens to hundreds of millions of dollars" in lost funding for research institutes that could lead to layoffs, hiring freezes, and ending research projects. The cuts had previously been outlined in Project 2025 to combat what it characterized as subsidies for "leftist agendas" and diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. In response, 22 state attorneys general filed a lawsuit and the cuts were paused on February 10. The NIH fired 1,000 to 1,200 workers on February 15. The cuts have led to universities pausing or reducing admissions for graduate biomedical research and medical school programs and hiring of postdoctoral researchers, and the NIH cancelling undergraduate internships and postbaccalaureate programs. Reports in mid-March stated that the NIH was expected to fire 3,400 to 5,000 people from its 20,000 person workforce.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) social vulnerability index and environmental justice index, which measured disparities in health risks, were removed from the organization's website, and on January 31, the data portal was taken completely offline in response to Executive Order 14168, which mandated that federal agencies use "sex" instead of "gender" and that they only recognize male and female sexes. AtlasPlus, an interactive CDC tool for tracking diseases such as HIV, hepatitis, sexually transmitted infections, and tuberculosis, was taken down. Census web pages about sexual identity and orientation were taken offline, and CDC pages about HIV and LGBTQ+ youth also disappeared. According to The Atlantic, the Trump administration targeted and replaced keywords in CDC content, including "pregnant people, transgender, binary, non-binary, gender, assigned at birth, binary [sic], non-binary [sic], cisgender, queer, gender identity, gender minority, anything with pronouns". About 750 CDC employees were fired over the weekend of February 15 with leadership stating that 10% (1,300) would be notified of their termination. The Food and Drug Administration purged online material on clinical trial diversity that encouraged drug developers to test the effects of medical treatments on different populations. After a court order, many web pages were restored. The administration added a disclaimer to the restored websites that notes the administration's opposition to what it terms "gender ideology", claiming it is "inaccurate".
Layoffs at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) began on February 27, 2025 when 880 employees (approximately 5% of the organization) were fired. The administration stated that no critical employees such as National Weather Service (NWS) meteorologists were cut, though a source within the NWS reported to CBS News that meteorologists were included in the layoffs.
In some cases, the government attempted to rehire scientists. Members of the technical staff at the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration, which oversees the nuclear arsenal, were fired on February 13; attempts to contact them for rehiring failed because their emails had been disconnected. The Department of Agriculture fired several scientists working on the ongoing avian flu outbreak over the same weekend and attempted to rehire them. Members of the CDC's Epidemic Intelligence Service were told their positions were eliminated, but the decision was reversed after an outcry.
There were dismissals of thousands of researchers and other employees of the Departments of Agriculture, Veterans Affairs, Health and Human Services (including the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)), and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
There were controversial appointments, such as those of anti-vaccine advocate and conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Secretary of Health and Human Services; climate change denialist Lee Zeldin as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency; and World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) co-founder Linda McMahon as secretary of education.
There were threats to de­fund major universities, and actions such as freezing dozens of Department of Energy grants to Princeton University.

There were mass deletions of open-access datasets, papers, and study protocols from across the federal government.
A New York Times analysis of funding through April identified 1,389 awards from the NIH that were cancelled and over 1,000 more that had been delayed, a reduction of $1.6 billion, or about one-fifth compared to the previous year. In the preceding decade, there were about 20 awards terminated each year (usually for circumstances like research misconduct or illness) and since 2012, fewer than five had been terminated for violating the NIH's terms and conditions. A ProPublica investigation spoke to over 150 researchers whose funding had been cut and identified over 30 clinical trials that were abruptly cancelled as well as studies into preventing stillbirths, child suicides, and infant brain damage.
According to the New York Times, government agencies also began compiling lists of keywords to search for to find grants to eliminate. Duke University's Chronicle reported that this approach led to cancellations of grants unrelated to DEI because they used the "trans-" prefix, such as in "transgenic material" or "signal transduction", or contained words like "systemic" in the context of neural circuits.
The administration proposed removing the NSF from its headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia, which would displace over 1,800 employees and give the space to the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The NSF employee union claimed plans for the space included a dedicated executive suite with a dining room and gym for secretary of HUD Scott Turner, which Turner denied. The building had been completed in 2017 with specifications to house the NSF.