The Unraveling of Public Science

From December 2024 to the end of 2025, 10,109 employees with Ph.Ds. in science, technology, engineering, math and health have left the federal workforce, taking decades of experience with them. While the Office of Personnel Management classifies most of the departures as voluntary, the Trump administration’s actions likely played a large role in the exodus as many feared being fired, disagreed with policy stances and/or took incentives like buyouts. The highest percentages of departures compared to the total Ph.D., workforce were seen at the National Science Foundation, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy. The highest total number of departures were at the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

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The federal government has long been known for providing reliable data across sectors, but with the Trump administration’s changes there have been more than 3,000 data sets removed from public access. From complete terminations to regular disruptions, experts worry about the elimination and the quality of the remaining available data. For example, as of April 2025, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has stopped releasing data on maternal and infant mortality, and in September, the Department of Agriculture canceled a report on household food security. Part of the disruptions include workforce reductions, with agencies losing anywhere from 10% to 30% of their data staff.

“We as a nation will be in a real bind if we don’t have access to those primary data that only the federal government has the scope and the scale and the resources to produce,” Denice Ross, the former U.S. chief data scientist under the Biden administration, told NOTUS. “There’s just no replacement for the complete and fair collection of data that the federal government is in charge of.”

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Federal cuts to scientific research have strained small businesses that supply equipment, technology and services, leading to layoffs and lost revenue. Efforts within the last year to streamline federal contracts have instead limited competition, delayed payments and removed key advocates for small businesses within agencies. Grant cuts for university research programs also have impacted the market for specialized equipment. Environmental research and development also have been hit particularly hard and impacted businesses that produce atmospheric monitoring technology.

“The administration also has pushed consolidation of contracts,” contract regulation expert and small business consultant Sam Le told Politico’s E&E news. “They’re taking smaller contracts and turning them into one larger contract. Often those are so large that small businesses can’t adequately compete.”

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Research across sectors has been disrupted as the federal government scales back its long-standing investment in science. Spending cuts and workforce reductions have halted research aimed at improving health and education outcomes. For example, canceled clinical trials at the NIH in 2025 impacted medical care for 74,000 people and affected disease research and prevention. Even as some funding has been restored through court orders and continued funding from Congress, the impact will be felt for years to come as studies are delayed and the pipeline for young scientists shrinks.

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The funding cut caused the department to lay off 80 employees and dozens of contractors, impacting health initiatives statewide including HIV care, tobacco cessation, well-water testing and emergency services. The layoffs included 11 disease investigators responsible for tracking HIV cases in Charlotte and connecting newly diagnosed patients with care. Officials worry that the funding loss will hamper their ability to provide vaccines and care to patients in isolated communities.

“Our state workforce is incredibly stressed,” said Kelly Kimple, a DHHS chief medical officer told the Carolina Public Press. “It’s like we’re trying to put a puzzle together but we’re missing half the pieces. Reductions disproportionately impact our rural communities that may have less resources available. It’s hard to effectively plan and ensure that we will be able to respond to future challenges.”

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At the Pittsburgh Veterans Administration (VA) hospital, federal hiring freezes and contract cuts have delayed experimental treatments for local veterans with advanced cancers of the mouth, throat and voice box and forced some facilities to operate without critical personnel.

“They were ready to enroll,” said Alanna Caffas to the New York Times, the chief executive of the Veterans Health Foundation, which administers the clinical trials. “They had the lab kits on site. They had the drug to dispense. But they couldn’t get the clinical research coordinator renewed.”

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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) typically operates a robust network of communications, keeping health care providers, scientists and the public informed on important disease updates. The changing administration caused disruptions in posting on Department of Health and Human Services social media channels and prompted CDC newsletters to stop distribution, including the CDC’s Health Alert Network which dispatches alerts about disease outbreaks to health professionals. Additionally, the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report for the first time did not release publications during the height of a wave of bird flu infections and the start of a measles outbreak in early 2025.

“Public health functions best when its experts are allowed to communicate the work that they do in real time, and that’s not happening,” Kevin Griffis, former director of communications at the CDC, told NPR. “That could put people’s lives at risk.”

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This past spring, the cancellation of $12 billion in Department of Health and Human Services grants to state health departments resulted in the loss of funding for several Wisconsin programs. One, Uplift Wisconsin, is a hotline answered by individuals who have experience with mental health or substance use challenges and is designed to support people before they reach a state of crisis. The hotline, known as the warmline, received more than 24,000 calls in 2024 and had been receiving $600,000 annually for three years but lost the last six months of its federal funding, disrupting services and triggering furloughs.

“This is a resource that is going to be sorely missed,” Martina Gollin-Graves, president and CEO of Mental Health America of Wisconsin told the Wisconsin Public Radio. “I’m worried about the fallout and how people are going to get their needs met, now that they can’t use the warmline.”

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Partnership for Climate Smart Commodities, a U.S. Department of Agriculture grant program that was terminated, brought over $900 million to Colorado to support conservation farming and ranching. Research projects on drought-resistant crops, soil health and greenhouse gas reduction remain unfinished, including work being done at the Colorado State University’s Soil Innovation Lab to study how farmers can effectively build supply for camelina, a seed that can be used to make sustainable jet fuel, which many Colorado farmers see as a promising new income stream.

“That knowledge and that data is going to farmers and it’s supporting us in a way that no one else currently is,” farmer Roy Pfaltzgraff told KUNC. “How do you assign a dollar value to that? The value of knowing changes everything from now on.”

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Staffing cuts have impacted federal food safety agencies, including the Food Safety and Inspection Service at the Department of Agriculture, which signs off on “USDA Inspected” stickers. Decisions from the administration are causing chaos, including the abrupt closing and reopening of two national food testing labs. Officials claim cuts are straining the workforce, causing food inspectors to visit double the number of facilities per day and raising concerns about how much food is legitimately earning the stamp of approval. Scientists have reported interruptions in routine produce testing and seafood inspections as well as shortages in basic lab testing supplies.

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The University of Tennessee school system has lost $37.7 million in federal grants, the majority of which impacts agricultural research and resources provided to Tennessee farmers. Grant cuts include a project that the university is sub-awarding across multiple states to help farmers and ranchers expand markets for climate-smart beef, dairy and small grazing animals.

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The FDA chose to break with common practice and not name the lettuce grower or issue public alerts following an E.coli outbreak that sickened more than 80 people last spring. This failed publicization of a major outbreak has been attributed to agency changes made by the Trump administration, including a scaling back of safety alert specialists and rules. Additionally, the administration disbanded the Department of Justice unit that pursues cases against companies that sell contaminated food, causing experts to worry about accountability.

Read the full story (Source: The Washington Post)

Data analysis shows that Forest Service work to reduce wildfires was down 40% in comparison to previous years, with only 1.7 million acres treated compared to an average of 3.6 million acres during past year. Disruptions and staffing cuts also have caused delays and reductions in the number of prescribed burns, which are carefully calculated and dependent on weather and time of year.

Read the full story (Source: The Washington Post)

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory lost 35% of its staff, including scientists with many years of expertise working in the region. The lab has been credited with preventing another crisis like the one in 2014 in Toledo, Ohio, where almost half a million people were told not to drink or touch the water. However, recent cuts and budget restrictions have harmed the lab’s ability to protect the public from toxic algae blooms that can contaminate drinking water.

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There has been an estimated 25% drop in permanent staff across the National Parks Service, despite Yosemite National Park’s 2025 visitors reaching a high level compared to recent years. With fewer park rangers and staff to educate the public, there has been an increase in visitors’ engaging in rule-breaking activities like BASE jumping off cliffs, littering and flying drones. Workforce cuts also come at a time when search and rescue missions at Yosemite were up by 40% between January and July compared to the previous year, requiring intense missions from teams as they trek into backcountry areas.

“There’s a lot of folks who are doing the jobs that three people used to do. Summers, in particular, our high season, really just crush people, because you have to be called out on overtime all the time. The search-and-rescue loads are intense. The traffic and parking, and Yosemite crowds is intense,” former Yosemite Superintendent Cicely Muldoon told E&E News.

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Funding cuts include the Cooperative Institute for Modeling the Earth’s system, a collaboration between Princeton University and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The institute studies how the ocean and atmosphere are changing, an analysis of how Earth’s water availability will fluctuate due to global warming, and a project that seeks to predict how changes in rainfall patterns and sea-level rise could affect coastal flooding. One of the program’s meteorologists is Syukuro Manabe, a Nobel laureate in physics whose work models Earth’s climate and predicts the effects of global warming.

Read the full story (Source: The New York Times)

The South-Central Indiana nonprofit, the Lake Monroe Water Fund, lost a grant of more than $200,000 from the U.S. Forest Service to support the removal of invasive tree species and rebuilding the native ecosystem. With the loss of already-awarded funding, the nonprofit is unable to access several matching grants at the state and county level that make up its $400,000 budget. Without this support, the team will have to halt the project entirely, harming the ability to repopulate the Yellowwood State Forest.

Read the full story (Source: Limestone Post Magazine )

Amid surging demand for lower-carbon cement, the Trump administration’s cancellation of $500 million to the Heidelberg plant in Mitchell, Ind., is costing the area hundreds of jobs and the country’s competitive edge in cutting carbon emissions from cement manufacturing. This plant would have significantly increased cement production by as much as 40%, which would support the growing international demand and the needs of domestic buyers who currently rely on imports for 20% of their purchases.

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The Department of Commerce canceled a previously established public, private partnership with the nonprofit Netcast and Arizona State University to build a $1.1 billion National Semiconductor Technology Center prototyping facility.

“We need answers from the Trump administration on how this announcement will affect the research and development facility at ASU, an investment widely supported by Arizona’s leaders – both Democrats and Republicans,” Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) said in a statement to KJZZ News. “We must ensure that the research for the next generation of microchips happens in America.”

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The National Laboratory of the Rockies in Golden, Colo. has recently undergone a name change in combination with its firing of researchers and operational staff. Following Trump administration directives, the name was changed from the National Renewable Energy Lab while 114 employees were let go in May 2025 and 134 employees were fired in February 2026. The workforce cuts will impact the premier international research lab’s facilities and experiments, including the improvement of energy sources like wind turbines and solar photovoltaic cells as well as innovative transportation fuel. The administration plans to use this and other labs’ federal lands for use by private data centers and power plant companies.

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The National Institutes of Standards and Technology’s world class laboratory, the Atomic Spectroscopy Group, is critical to the advancement of microchips, medical devices and space discovery. The lab’s findings have been critical to studies across science disciplines, being regularly cited in research papers around the world. The team was rehired in contractor roles at NASA, but with the disruption it will likely take over a year and a half to have the teams’ experiments operational again.

Read the full story (Source: The New York Times)