This past week was a flashpoint in science advocacy on multiple fronts. The Union of Concerned Scientists launched our new Science Rising initiative last week (watch the kickoff), which brought many in the scientific community together to take action against Trump administration attacks on science. Also last week, a recently dropped draft rule from the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), their so-called Uniform Grants Regulation, has animated the scientific community, who are pushing back powerfully. The rule would completely change the way the federal government disperses funding for research, giving political appointees in the Trump administration veto power over any funding that doesn’t align with their own narrow priorities.
After an initial outcry from experts tracking this rule closely, major institutions and prominent figures across science world issued statements in response, thousands have tuned in to learn how to respond, and scientists and science supporters are geared up to submit public comments opposing this proposal. Coalitions in the scientific community and beyond are also working to extend the comment period. All told, OMB is poised to be inundated with tens of thousands of unique and powerful public comments on their dangerous and ill-conceived draft rule.
We need this unity beyond the OMB rule
It’s energizing to see this broad and clear response from the scientific community to a proposal that stands to disrupt the federal science research apparatus—an enterprise that is responsible for decades of significant scientific progress, economic development, and global science leadership for the nation.
The OMB proposal is far from the first attack on science and scientists we’ve seen under the second Trump term. It matters if the administration dismantles the US scientific research apparatus. It also matters how that research is used (or dismissed) to make government decisions that affect communities across the globe. It matters if key subject matter experts are fired from government service. It matters if federal investments designed to address longstanding inequities in underserved communities are clawed back. And it matters if the administration takes a sledgehammer to the safeguards that protect science and scientists from political interference.
The strong and loud response to the proposed OMB rule has demonstrated the broad unity and collective response that’s possible when we all work together. The scientific community would do well to apply this same level of activation to the larger assaults on science and democracy that are harming communities across the country.
Signs of bravery in a culture of fear
In a moment when we are still seeing significant fear and hesitancy to criticize the administration from pockets of the scientific community, this kind of solidarity is desperately needed.
Last week, at the American Diabetes Association’s annual meeting in New Orleans, police officers expelled five scientists from the conference for distributing an editorial criticizing the Trump administration’s politicization of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), ahead of a planned keynote from NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya. These researchers were simply sharing information about how the NIH is not living up to its promises and harming the communities they serve, including people living with diabetes. The editorial in question is free to read and available to all online. And yet, this peaceful and evidence-based criticism was met with expulsion by armed officers.
This display of censorship sends a chilling effect through the scientific community for anyone willing to speak up about the harms happening. And unfortunately, this event is not an isolated incident, but it instead is among many instances in which the science community has chosen to be silent or capitulate when faced with an opportunity to speak up about the Trump administration’s actions. We need scientific leaders and institutions to step up, not silence those showing us that bravery.
Now is the time for courage
So let’s step up. Let’s be brave. There are many issues that can now use our sustained and collective attention. You can join the Science Rising Action Corps, and hold members of Congress accountable to protect science and democracy. You can urge your elected officials to fund FEMA now to protect our communities from disasters, to pass the Scientific Integrity Act that will allow federal scientists to do their jobs free from political interference, to save one of the most important climate research centers, to preserve the US Forest Service, and to close dangerous loopholes in nuclear weapons regulations.
You can rally your community to turn out and protest Trump administration policies. You can join the UCS Science Network and learn the most effective ways to engage with elected officials. You can learn about creating and supporting alternative, independent structures for scientific decisionmaking. You can speak up in your own social and professional circles, show up for your neighbors, and make your values clear.
This week shows what we are capable of. Let’s keep going.