Science policy this week: May 26, 2025

What’s Ahead

Trump Nuclear Executive Order Signing May 2025 — White House staff secretary Will Scharf, center left, describes an executive order on “Gold Standard Science” to President Donald Trump during a signing ceremony. The president did not comment on the order during the ceremony, which focused on four separate executive orders dedicated to nuclear energy.

Molly Riley / The White House

Trump issues order on ‘Gold Standard Science’

President Donald Trump signed an executive order last Friday that directs agencies to revise their scientific integrity policies to adhere to the principles of “Gold Standard Science,” defined as science that is reproducible, transparent, falsifiable, subject to unbiased peer review, clear about errors and uncertainties, skeptical of assumptions, collaborative, interdisciplinary, accepting of negative results, and free from conflicts of interest. The order also states the new policies should “encourage the open exchange of ideas, provide for consideration of different or dissenting viewpoints, and protect employees from efforts to prevent or deter consideration of alternative scientific opinions.” Enforcement of the policy will be assigned to a political appointee designated by each agency head.

The order directs the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy to issue guidance for federal agency adoption of “Gold Standard Science” principles in the next 30 days. Agencies will then update their policies related to the production and use of scientific information, in consultation with OSTP and the Office of Management and Budget.

OSTP Director Michael Kratsios previewed some of the goals of the executive order in a speech at the National Academy of Sciences on May 19. “At the heart of the practices that make up Gold Standard Science is a suspicion of blind consensus and a celebration of informed dissent,” Kratsios said. He described a “crisis of confidence” in scientists that “stems from fear that political biases are displacing the vital search for truth.” He also took aim at DEI initiatives, which he said represent “an existential threat to the real diversity of thought that forms the foundation of the scientific community.”

Trump signed the order at the end of a ceremony held to highlight four other executive orders promoting nuclear energy that he signed earlier in the event. Among them is an order that overhauls oversight of advanced reactor testing and sets the goal of the Department of Energy approving three pilot reactor projects that are capable of achieving criticality by next summer.

House schedules 2026 budget hearings

The House Appropriations Committee will ramp up its work on the federal budget for fiscal year 2026 starting next week. Subcommittees will meet through June and into mid-July to advance funding proposals for agencies under their jurisdiction. The most research-heavy agencies will not come up until July, when the three subcommittees responsible for the departments of Energy, Health and Human Services, and Commerce meet. One of those subcommittees also covers the National Science Foundation, NASA, and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

The Defense subcommittee, which oversees all Defense Department research spending, will meet the second week of June. The subcommittee responsible for the Environmental Protection Agency and much of the Interior Department, including the U.S. Geological Survey, will meet in late June.

President Trump’s efforts to withhold and reallocate funds contrary to congressional appropriations promise to complicate the 2026 budget process. The Government Accountability Office concluded last week that the Trump administration had improperly withheld congressionally appropriated funds for electric vehicles in violation of the Impoundment Control Act. Administration officials dismissed the determination, with budget director Russell Vought calling it “rearview mirror stuff.” GAO has 39 similar investigations in progress.

Trump administration tightens screws on Harvard

The Trump administration moved to cancel all of the federal government’s remaining contracts with Harvard University today, worth an estimated $100 million. This latest round of cancellations comes after the administration froze or cancelled more than $3 billion in grants and contracts awarded to Harvard as part of a protracted dispute between the administration and the university. The administration has accused Harvard of failing to meet its civil rights obligations, including failing to adequately address antisemitic behavior on campus. Harvard denies any wrongdoing and has sued to block the previously cancelled grants.

In addition to funding freezes, the administration pulled Harvard’s Student and Exchange Visitor program certification last week, aiming to prevent the university from enrolling foreign students and jeopardizing the legal status of thousands of existing students. Harvard successfully obtained a temporary restraining order blocking the decertification last week.

Also on our radar

The Senate is set to vote on whether to confirm billionaire tech CEO Jared Isaacman as head of NASA during the first week of June.
Joseph Edlow, Trump’s nominee to run U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, said at a nomination hearing last week that he wants to end the Optional Practical Training Program, which allows international students to work in the U.S. immediately after graduation, and instead limit work authorizations to actively enrolled students.
Issues in Science and Technology will hold an event examining the political polarization of science on Thursday.
Hundreds of contracts at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are reportedly stalled awaiting sign-off from Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. The backlog appears to be the result of Lutnick’s requirement that all contracts worth more than $100,000 receive his signature before moving forward.
The National Academies’ latest quadrennial review of the National Nanotechnology Initiative calls on Congress to reauthorize the initiative within two years and increase its funding in the process.