The MAGA War on Science Is Deadly—and It’s Just Getting Started

Over the past century, universities have emerged as key nodes in the scientific establishment that converts public funds into research. On the whole it has been a spectacularly successful system. But it has had the unintended effect of rendering the universities hostage to federal funding. It so happens that a good chunk of that funding goes into biomedical research. In brief: This administration is willing to let people die of cancer if that’s what it takes to win the war on supposedly “woke” universities.

Another target of the administration’s aggression is this thing called the “administrative state.” It’s hard to say exactly what the administrative state is, other than a catchall for everything that conservative ideologues don’t like about government. The trouble is, of course, that the administrative state is really the workings of a functioning democratic government, and the biggest part of the government consists of administering things that are very hard to cut: the Defense Department foremost, but also things like air traffic management, nuclear safety, and so on. Much easier to cut are contracts with outside suppliers, especially those whose benefits accrue to future generations. In short: Science funding has fallen victim to the conservatives’ need to perform violence against a demonized bureaucracy.

Right now, we are only seeing the short-term consequence of the Republican war on science: Projects are canceled, and funding is denied, individual careers are broken, research institutions are diminished, and scientists drain out of the country for safe havens around the world. The long-term consequences of Trump’s war on science are likely to be far more serious.