Dismantling Research & Science
2011
2011-01-01 From 2011 through 2019, Fox News repeatedly peddled that universities were paying $503K, then $3M, then $3B in funding to “watch shrimp on a treadmill”. They failed to cite the actual cost being paid for out-of-pocket by the researchers, or that the research was used to study food safety and how much bacteria can end up in our seafood.
2025 January
2025-01-01 Key space programs at risk now include active missions New Horizons, Juno, Mars Odyssey and Maven, observatories Chandra Xray, future developments for Davinci and Veritas, and new space telescopes like the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and the Habitable Worlds Observatory.
2025-01-20 Trump rescinded Executive Order 14007 President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
2025-01-20 Trump rescinded Executive Order 14143 Providing for the Appointment of Alumni of AmeriCorps to the Competitive Service.
2025 February
2025-02-03 In a social media post, Elon Musk rehashed old conservative uproar about shrimp-treadmill research simply to rekindle and reinforce distrust and misinformation. He wrote, “Insane wasting of taxpayer money”.
https://www.reuters.com/fact-check/shrimp-treadmill-study-cost-misrepresented-2025-02-21/
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1886290989133762746?lang=en
2025 April
2025-04-25 The Trump administration cut $400M in funding to AmeriCorps, stating the grants no longer fit AmeriCorps priorities, but the administration did not articulate further. The cuts impacted 32,000 people, halted work in fields like disaster recovery, education, environmental stewardship and public health.
2025 July
2025-07-31 The Trump administration cut UCLA research grants, impacting things like Parkinson’s disease treatment. A judge ordered the restoration of some of these grants because the government failed to provide sufficient justification for terminating them.
https://www.npr.org/2025/09/23/nx-s1-5550852/trump-restore-grant-funding-ucla
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-09-22/rita-lin-federal-judge-restores-ucla-nih-grants
https://calmatters.org/education/higher-education/2025/07/ucla/