Senate Dems Say Trump’s NIH Cuts Total $2.7B

During the first three months of this year, the National Institutes of Health cut $2.7 billion in grant funding compared to the same time frame in 2024, according to a new report from Senate Democrats released Tuesday.

That’s about $1 billion higher than some analyses that have sought to quantify Trump’s cuts at NIH, the largest funder of biomedical research. The agency halted grant awards at the start of Trump’s term and has been slow to ramp back up since restarting reviews last month. The report from Democrats on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee aimed to document the cuts and the impact to public health. 

“In search of more power, the Trump administration has attacked science by defunding research, silencing scientists, sowing chaos, and spreading misinformation,” the report states.

The committee’s Democrats reviewed NIH data and interviewed researchers as well as employees who were fired in order to compile the report, which criticizes the recent mass layoffs at the Health and Human Services Department, which includes NIH. According to the report, 20,000 HHS employees lost their jobs during the first quarter of the year. The Democrats requested more information about the layoffs and the planned restructuring of the department but didn’t hear back from HHS.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, an Independent from Vermont and the ranking member of the HELP committee, condemned the cuts in a news release about the report.

“Since January, Trump has launched an unprecedented, illegal and outrageous attack on science and scientists. Trump is not only denying scientific truth but actively seeking to undermine it,” Sanders said. “That is beyond unacceptable. This is a war we cannot allow Trump to win. Far too many lives are at stake.”