The head of the Senate minority, Chuck Schumer of New York, aroused indignation among the Democrats of his party last week when he helped to adopt a expense bill led by the Republicans.Credit: Al Drago / Bloomberg via Getty
The American government avoided a closure at the end of last week after President Donald Trump signed a spending agreement that probably locks the modest reductions in scientific financing this year. But a greater crisis for science is still looming While the Trump administration and the Republicans in Congress continue to seek massive cuts in the federal budget for 2025 and beyond.
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Assuming that federal spending follows current trends, the “continuous resolution” agreement of March 15 means that overall research and development funding during the current financial year, which ends on September 30, was probably going to be in around 193 billion dollars – which represents a relatively modest reduction of 3.5% compared to the 2024. (Nih), The largest funder for the world of biomedical research. The expenditure agreement requires a reduction of 67% of the agency’s financing through the law of the 21st century Cures, which includes investments in the Cancer Moonshot 2016 program and research on the brain by advancing the innovative neurotechnology initiative (brain); Total funding under the Guerices Act will drop from $ 280 million to $ 127 million.
The bill on expenses, written exclusively by the Republicans at the Congress, does not include many usual details of details online from the agencies precisely where to put their money. This gives the Trump administration’s room for maneuver by directing where the money is going – one of the reasons why many Congress Democrats have threatened to close the government rather than vote for the bill. At the end of last week, however, a small group of democratic senators, including the head of the Senate minority, Chuck Schumer of New York, opposed the rest of the party and advanced it to keep the doors of the government open.
It remains to be seen that the Trump administration will really spend money on continuous resolution. In the past two months Since Trump took up his dutiesHis team ignored the previous spending laws adopted by the Congress by freezing And put an end to federal subsidiesIncluding those of the NIH, which the administration does not support. It is unlikely that the last expenditure agreement is changing this dynamic, explains Jennifer Zeitzer, who heads the Office of Public Affairs to the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology in Rockville, Maryland. “We are in another era at this time when nothing is normal”.
Nothing normal
Policy specialists say the Trump team could still try to reduce the 2025 budgets with a separate legislative set of “ cancellations ” – a distinct process of the credits used to finance the government. It would be the easy way – and legal for the White House to go through many financing reductions for this year she is looking for, say political observers.
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