Trump Slashes Science, Americans Pay the Price

Since Trump’s return to the White House, the effects of slashed research funding and federal staff layoffs are beginning to ripple into the everyday lives of Americans.

Federally funded scientific institutions provide various public services—many of which save lives and generate economic value.

For instance, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) provides weather forecasts used by farmers to decide when to plant, irrigate, and harvest, and by authorities to prepare for disasters.

As a U.S. public health agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) collects critical data for effective disease treatment and funds clinics that provide such care.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) conducts pollution research that is essential to crafting regulations protecting Americans from harmful pollutants.

Cuts to these and similar institutions may harm the general public.

Trump's budget-cutting task force, DOGE, has already implemented layoffs at NOAA. A leaked memo reveals that Congress is preparing for deeper cuts to the agency’s research budget and further position eliminations, which would further disrupt operations.

Under normal conditions, NOAA’s National Weather Service (NWS) launches weather balloons twice a day equipped with instruments that measure atmospheric pressure, temperature, and humidity—data essential to forecasting storm paths and intensities.

A current NWS employee reported that since the Trump administration took office, four of the 13 forecasters at his office have quit. Now, he and the remaining staff can only launch balloons at night, effectively halving the resolution of collected data. Other offices have also delayed or suspended balloon launches.

The western Rocky Mountain region, including Idaho and Montana, is the most affected. Chris Vagasky, a meteorologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, noted, “That’s a region prone to intense spring storm systems.”

The NWS office in Jackson, Kentucky can no longer schedule night shifts. Last week, a tornado struck Kentucky, killing at least 19 people. The agency struggled to respond due to staff shortages. Workers had to work overtime, and nearby offices sent reinforcements.

The reduction in data collection is compounded by another problem: layoffs in teams responsible for issuing public danger alerts.

Kayla Besong previously worked at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii. Her team, like hospital doctors, carried pagers to receive alerts the moment seismic activity was detected. She explained they had to evaluate the earthquake’s location, size, and magnitude to determine tsunami risk and whether public warnings were needed. Typically, two people were on call, resulting in very long shifts for the understaffed team.

In February, when DOGE terminated federal probationary employees, Besong was laid off. She warned that long shifts heavily burden already short-staffed colleagues. “Burnout was already a serious issue,” even before the layoffs.

Fatigued employees are more prone to error—and during extreme weather, those errors can be deadly.

At the CDC, reduced staffing has also made pandemic prevention more difficult.

For example, a medical monitoring project launched in 2005 was responsible for collecting and analyzing data on people living with HIV. Until recently, state and local health departments across the U.S. relied on this data—covering co-morbidities, transmission behaviors, and barriers to care—to guide services.

On April 1, 16 of the 17 members of the project’s team were laid off, terminating a program that had lasted 20 years. A CDC doctor stated, “The only nationally representative data on people with HIV is now gone.”

Up to 45% of staff working in the CDC’s HIV prevention team have been laid off. All HIV-related research projects at the CDC are suspended, and many basic healthcare service grants have been terminated.

HIV prevention became a target partly because it focuses on minority and LGBTQ+ communities—groups with especially high infection rates. The Trump administration has dismissed such focus as “woke ideology” obstructing “hard science.”

The Empowerment Resource Center, located in downtown Atlanta, Georgia, is one of many HIV clinics affected. A $400,000 CDC grant used to serve gay and transgender patients is currently on hold—May’s payment has yet to arrive.

This week, all staff in Fulton County’s HIV division (Atlanta’s county) were also laid off. That was the clinic’s only other funding source. Jacqueline Brown, head of the nonprofit, said she faced tough choices on what services to cut and whom to stop serving. “We’ll hang on as long as we can, but eventually we’ll have to shut some programs down—we really don’t have the money.” Emory University medical professor Leandro Mena believes such cuts will increase HIV infections over the next two to three years.

Other agencies are also under pressure. In early May, Trump-appointed EPA director Lee Zeldin announced a restructuring that would return the EPA’s workforce to Reagan-era levels—a reduction of around 25%—and eliminate its dedicated research division: the Office of Research and Development. This office compiles independent evidence on pollution issues and underpins EPA’s guidelines and regulations.

Since the EPA’s founding in 1970, its regulations have reduced common air pollutants by nearly 80% and save tens of thousands of American lives each year from premature death.

Under Trump’s proposed budget, the EPA would also lose nearly 55% of its funding, justified by eliminating “biased, overly cautious models” and “woke climate research.”

Perhaps, one day, the government will realize that issuing deadly storm warnings and improving public health benefit all Americans. But for now, there is no sign of policy reversal.