By Maddy Brown
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The US Government and Climate Science
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Many of the characters in this play are glaciologists: scientists who study glaciers and ice. Glaciers exist on almost every continent, and studying their makeup, mass, and recession is vital to understanding the effects and potential of climate change.
Donald Trump has been attacking the climate and climate science since his first campaign for president in 2016. Examples of his threat to the climate are plentiful: The proposed NASA Earth Science budget has been slashed in half from the previous year, the US has withdrawn from the Paris Agreement, and approvals for fossil fuel projects have been fast-tracked. There are assuredly a dozen new catastrophes since the writing of this page. Running parallel to this is the administration’s attacks on equity, diversity, and inclusion measures.
The two intersect in a 43 page report on how the National Science Foundation is “wasting” money on grants supporting Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in science, from the office of Ted Cruz. The National Science Foundation, a government organization responsible for funding a majority of American scientific research, has since been subject to grant freezes, including active grants. Staff at the NSF has been cut by 10%, with firing occurring mid-project for several researchers and program directors. The team of program directors shepherding Antarctic field research is down to one full-time staffer.
The field, understandably, is in panic. Universities are pausing admissions, introducing hiring freezes, and are unsure about the state of their research, and American scientific research in general. Not only does this halt necessary and time sensitive research, but by targeting equity, diversity, and inclusion in the sciences, the Trump administration is sanctioning less effective science.
In a 2024 paper, glaciologist Lizz Ultee and others argue that glaciology is not diverse enough to serve the populations who are most impacted by our rapidly changing environment:
“The climate problems that are important for me in my home state of Vermont will be very different from the most important problems for a region like the Central Andes or Greenland or even the US Gulf Coast. I care deeply about how glacier change will affect people in those regions — but I can’t come up with all of the research questions that might be important to them… It is very unlikely that the research we pursue today is what’s really needed for the communities who are already experiencing glacier and ice-sheet change.”
We deserve science that is effective and supported by robust funding. We need this science. We just experienced the hottest January on record. Like it or not, these are the facts, and the Trump administration is doing everything they can to keep the facts from us.
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WHAT YOU CAN DO
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