On Friday, April 11, the administration announced it would again attempt to slash funding for critical American research. This time it announced it would cut the Facilities and Administrative (F&A) rate, or the indirect costs rate, to 15 percent for all Department of Energy (DOE) research grants to colleges and universities. This action would have an immediate and dire impact on critical energy, physical sciences and engineering research nationwide.
It also sets a very dangerous precedent that could be used to undermine federal investments in research at many other federal agencies. A similar attempt to unilaterally cap the indirect cost rate for NIH grants to colleges and universities was enjoined nationwide.
F&A costs are the real and necessary costs of conducting the groundbreaking research that has led to so many advances, that has positioned the United States as a global scientific leader and has improved the lives of our nation’s citizens. With funding from DOE, our nation’s researchers are driving innovations in fusion and advanced nuclear energy, nuclear security, microelectronics, materials research, advanced computing, fossil and alternative energy research, grid technologies, quantum science, and AI in furtherance of American science and a secure energy future. A cut to F&A for DOE research grants would be a cut to groundbreaking American scientific research at more than 300 colleges and universities nationwide that currently provide the breakthroughs building our nation’s energy independence and nuclear security, while also innovating new technologies that boost American manufacturing and our global economic competitiveness.
Besides damaging the ability of research universities to help strengthen our nation’s energy sector and create new American economic opportunities, this cut would also undermine universities’ training of the next generation of highly skilled energy sector workers and innovators. The loss of this American workforce pipeline would be a blow to the U.S. economy, to American science and innovation, and to our dominant position in the world as a leader in energy and other critical areas of research.
It would be, quite simply, a self-inflicted wound and a gift to competitors and potential adversaries such as China.
Today, the Association of American Universities, the American Council on Education, and the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities jointly filed a new lawsuit in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, along with a number of impacted research university co-plaintiffs, seeking to halt the proposed DOE F&A cut. Besides its destructive impact on research and training, this new action by the government again runs afoul of the longstanding regulatory frameworks governing federal grants and administrative law. Judicial relief is amply justified and urgently needed. This action is ill-conceived and self-defeating for the American businesses, workers, and families who benefit from these scientific and technological advances as well as the nation as a whole. We look forward to presenting our case in court.
Whether applied to DOE, NIH, or any other federal research agency, the fundamental truth remains the same -- a cut to F&A is a cut to research that carries with it enormous consequences for the security, well-being, and prosperity of the American people.