Public well-being · science
Medical research grants terminated, by president
Active, already-awarded National Institutes of Health research grants cancelled or suspended mid-stream during each administration. Ending funding a scientist has already been promised, for reasons other than misconduct or non-performance, is a rare event; a handful happen in a normal presidency. In 2025 it happened thousands of times. Read the caveat first, because this is not the same as cutting the budget.
This is a disruption, not a budget cut, and the distinction matters. The administration proposed cutting the NIH budget by about 40% (roughly $18 billion) for 2026, but Congress rejected the cut and enacted a small increase; the NIH top-line held. It also tried to cap research overhead payments at 15%, but a court struck that down, and the First Circuit upheld that ruling on appeal in January 2026. What actually happened is narrower and unprecedented: the mid-stream termination of thousands of active grants (the Supreme Court let the terminations proceed in August 2025 while leaving the underlying guidance ruled unlawful), the firing of about 1,200 NIH staff, and tighter grant paylines, so aggregate 2025 spending held roughly level even as specific research was cut off. The count itself is unsettled, ranging from ~2,300 grants (~$3.8B) mid-year to ~5,800 cancelled or suspended over the full year, depending on the date and whether reinstated grants are netted out.