OMB Proposes New Rules to Reshape Federal Science Grants
Get the Health newsletter
Daily health & science — research, biotech, public health, the studies worth knowing. Free.
- The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released proposed rules in May containing dozens of changes to the US Code of Federal Regulations governing federal grants, codifying oversight of award decisions by political appointees and requiring grants to be evaluated against the president's policy priorities.
- The proposed rules would prohibit the use of federal funds for bilateral or multilateral collaborations with 'covered foreign countries or covered foreign entities,' a clause critics say could obstruct US-Chinese scientific work on cancer, environmental health, and new technologies.
- The public comment period on the OMB proposal closes July 14, and the American Astronomical Society warned the rule would cause 'significant harm to the scientific community, research institutions, and professional societies.'
- The National Science Foundation (NSF) is cutting budgets for basic science research programs and redirecting money to a new $1.5 billion initiative called 'X-Labs' — a successor to the prior 'Tech Labs' program — meant to support creation of new products and technologies 'outside of traditional institutions.'
- Grant freezes, administrative disarray at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and new layers of political review hunting for keywords such as 'disparity' and 'marginalized' are progressively making federally-funded research more onerous, with the article's author warning that junior researchers are being nudged toward leaving science or leaving the US.
Why it matters: With the OMB comment period closing July 14, the proposed rules would condition federal grants on presidential priorities and restrict international collaborations — changes the American Astronomical Society warns will cause significant harm while NSF redirects $1.5 billion from basic research into a private-sector-focused X-Labs initiative that answers to shareholders rather than the public.
