New US Rules: Any Grant Can Be Canceled Anytime
▼ Summary
– The proposed rules would give political appointees final say on grant funding, instructing them not to “routinely defer” to peer reviewers.
– The Office of Management and Budget is merging the executive order with other priorities and sending it through formal rulemaking to avoid losing in court.
– The new rules would allow any federal agency to cancel any grant at any time based on a vague “national interest” assertion.
– The rules ban grants on certain culture war topics, limit international collaborations, and block spending on publishing and conferences.
– The OMB is turning previous agency-by-agency grantmaking guidance into uniform formal rules through a public feedback process.
Last August, the Trump administration issued an executive order designed to reshape how the U.S. government manages grant funding. Under the longstanding system that helped establish America as a scientific superpower, peer reviewers evaluated the scientific merit and feasibility of grant applications. Subject-matter experts within funding agencies then used those ratings to decide which projects received support. The proposed rules, however, would hand final authority to political appointees, with explicit instructions not to “routinely defer” to peer reviewers.
In the months since, the administration has lost numerous court battles. The reason is straightforward: executive orders cannot bypass legal requirements, and they can be overturned if they lack solid justification. To avoid a similar outcome, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has decided to merge the executive order with other administration priorities and push it through the formal federal rulemaking process.
The result is a nightmare scenario for U. S. scientific research. Not only does peer review become a secondary concern, but the new rules empower any federal agency to cancel any grant at any time, based on the vague claim that it no longer serves the “national interest.” The document also bans funding for several culture war topics, restricts international collaborations, and blocks spending on essential activities like publishing papers and attending conferences.
In short, this is a blueprint for how the government can complete the work of dismantling American science.
Putting the OMB in charge
Previously, grantmaking rules were handled on an agency-by-agency basis. The OMB provided overarching guidance, but the Department of Energy, for instance, wasn’t expected to follow the same procedures as the National Institutes of Health. The new document changes that dynamic, transforming what was once guidance into binding rules. By publishing these rules, the OMB has initiated the formal rulemaking process, which will proceed through public comment and culminate in a final rule published in the Federal Register.
(Source: Ars Technica)
