Congress passed a bipartisan budget deal that covers two years, a remarkable feat considering the history of short-term budget resolutions. Then, President Trump released his own budget proposal for 2019. What does the Trump budget say about science? Here are some highlights:
-A 37 percent cut to EPA’s Office of Science and Technology
-Twenty percent cut to the budget of NOAA and U.S. Geological Survey
-Zeroing out the Sea Grant and the National Estuarine Research Reserve in Waquoit, Mass.
-An additional $1.5 billion for the Department of Energy, though it eliminates an experimental program called ARPA-E
-Disaster relief funding is up, but climate research programs targeted for cuts
-Support for three of eight USGS Climate Science Centers
-FEMA gets half a billion dollars for disaster preparation grant program, but flood mapping and risk analysis program would get cut almost in half
-Coast Guard gets funds for first new icebreaker in 40 years
“It’s not an administration that’s really trying to prioritize science and technology,” said Matt Hourihan, director of the R&D Budget and Policy Program at the American Association for the Advancement of Science. “What they’re really trying to do is save money.”
This effort to cut spending went farther than most administrations by leaving about $57 billion on the table allowed under a recent Congressional spending cap deal. “What we’ve got here is a budget that is literally saying, ‘We’re going to cut all these programs --we could’ve restored that funding, but we’d rather simply let those dollars evaporate,’” Hourihan said.
