March update: Together, we can save ourselves
Together, we can save ourselves
In our February newsletter, we wrote about not giving up. We stand firm in the belief that giving up is not an option. But we have to be honest – we have a difficult road ahead.
In just the first two months of the second Trump administration, we have already added 43 entries (with more in progress) to our Silencing Science Tracker, versus 26 entries for the first two months of his first term. And we heard just last week that he has rescinded the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) scientific integrity policy, which took effect on December 31, 2024. This policy aimed to protect scientific research from political bias and interference.
We have to be our own champions. We have to stand up and fight back. We are all going to have to get our hands dirty. It’s going to be messy. We are going to feel despair, but we have to leave room for hope. And for many scientists, including many of our clients, this will not be the first time.
There are reasons for hope. The growing resistance on the ground – in the streets and in town halls – reminds us that we are one small but mighty part of a much larger movement. Scientists are advocating for science in their hometown papers. Some governors are fighting back, in one instance winning the restoration of billions in federal funding for the state. Judges are issuing rulings that support science and federal researchers. We believe from experience that there are effective legal pathways to challenge anti-science actions and we’re putting our expertise to use in this area.
Along with our colleagues at the Sabin Center, we continue to aggressively track every anti-science action by the government. (See other trackers here.) We’re also helping federal scientists and researchers by providing free legal help, as we have done since our founding – and in steadily increasing numbers.
And our small but mighty organization is growing! We recently hired another attorney to help handle the increased workload, and we’re glad to have Jacob Metz-Lerman on our team. We have also welcomed another board member, Jane Zelikova, who brings her experience as an ecologist and science communicator.
As isolating as a hostile government takeover feels, none of us are alone in this fight.
If you can, please consider joining us.
Please note that things are moving very quickly and may have changed by the time you read this newsletter.
News & Updates
What are the consequences of US climate policy
March 19, 2025 | Tagesschau
The Trump administration is ” more destructive in its course” than during its first term, says Lauren Kurtz of [CSLDF]… But she says the administration isn’t necessarily more successful with this course: “They’re being incredibly sloppy. There are already more than 100 lawsuits, and many of these lawsuits will not go well for Trump.”
Trump official who tried to downplay major climate report now will oversee it
March 4, 2025 | E&E News, Politico
In July 2024, Virginia Burkett, chair of the U.S. Global Change Research Program, filed a whistleblower complaint noting retaliatory actions against her for opposing changes to the National Climate Assessment. That complaint is still open and under investigation, according to the [CSLDF], which is working with Burkett.
‘Trump and Musk are plunging American science into indescribable chaos’
March 3, 2025 | Le Monde
This digital coup enables tight control of power over the conduct of science and the production of knowledge, which is nothing like what the first Trump administration had implemented. A 2022 survey conducted by Romany Webb of the Sabin Center and Lauren Kurtz of CSLDF indicated that the “war on science” waged between 2017 and 2021 consisted, for federal researchers, of a series of ad hoc censures, deletions of certain data, or even pressures leading to self-censorship.
How Trump Muzzled Science
January 24, 2025 | The Meta News
In four years, nearly 350 attacks [on science] have been recorded – others have certainly gone under the radar – particularly on the subject of climate change. “They coincide with one of Trump’s key objectives: to roll back regulations that scientists have shown would improve public health or environmental quality,” analyze Romany Webb of the Sabin Center and Lauren Kurtz of CSLDF in a 2022 study.