Proposed NIH Budget Cuts Get Blasted by Lawmakers, Researchers
Read the full article in Bloomberg Government
Some top lawmakers and research and patient advocacy groups are frustrated with President Donald Trump’s request to cut back the National Institutes of Health’s budget by $5 billion.
“The request has several shortcomings,” Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee chair, said in a statement released shortly after the administration’s budget release Friday. “For example, the proposal includes unwarranted funding cuts in biomedical research.”
Biomedical research funding has proved to be surprisingly durable even as the administration searches for reductions in government spending, suggesting it has cachet among Republicans even as they decry waste and fraud. The Trump administration pitched an $18 billion reduction for fiscal year 2026—which would have slashed the agency’s budget by about 40%.
“I think the notion of a $5 billion cut, it’s so tempting to think about things in the context of last year, that’s better—but that’s not a good baseline by any stretch of the imagination,” said Ellie Dehoney, senior vice president of policy and advocacy of the science advocacy group Research!America. “I really think it doesn’t make sense for us, at an economic, national security, or global competitiveness level” to reduce funding for the NIH.
…