Mere hours after taking the oath of office on the 20th of January and entering his second presidency, Donald Trump signed executive orders dismantling diversity initiatives and restructuring federal funding policies. Among his controversial directives, changes to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programmes and funding for scientific research have sparked widespread concern.
Trump claims: “We have ended the tyranny of so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion policies all across the entire federal government and, indeed, the private sector and our military, and our country will be woke no longer.” Federally-funded agencies and certain additional corporations receiving public funds have started to remove mentions of keywords related to DEI from their official materials and websites—screening for words such as “diversity”, “inclusion”, “women”, and “race”. The National Science Foundation (NSF), a key institution supporting scientific research, is now reviewing grant applications with stricter scrutiny. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) have also announced cuts to payments covering overhead costs for research institutions that receive DEI grants. These cuts could disproportionately impact researchers from underrepresented backgrounds who depend on these funding streams.
Beyond targeting DEI initiatives, Trump is also implementing changes to how the NIH allocates research funding. The agency is capping how much large public funders of biomedical research pay for indirect costs at 15%, costs which cover essentials for medical research. This cut extends beyond the NIH to the NSF, which has historically weighed grant applications based on both their intellectual merit and their role in broadening the participation of underrepresented groups in science. Staff at the NSF are expecting layoffs of 25 to 50% over the next two months, and Trump’s proposed new budget is set to cut funding by billions of dollars for their medical research. These cuts pose a threat to an extraordinary number of scientists, particularly women and ethnic minorities who already face barriers in securing funding. Julia Barnes, an anthropologist based in Tennessee who receives funding from the NSF, told the Council of Foreign Regulations: “The United States is not a stable place to be a scientist. Scientists funded by the NSF aren’t paid a lot, but we care a lot about the research we do.”
While Trump’s policies do not directly impact funding for medical research or DEI initiatives in the UK, they are already influencing corporate practices worldwide. As US companies scale back their DEI initiatives, their UK counterparts are doing the same. Deloitte, a notable audit and finance consultancy firm, have quietly removed their “core message” of delivering DEI across their company from their website. Google, Meta, and Amazon have all shifted away from the emphasis on a culture of inclusivity. A uni-student favourite, McDonald’s, has also scrapped its inclusion practices, four years after launching a push for more diversity in its ranks. Contrastingly, JP Morgan has stuck to its guns, maintaining the bank’s commitment to working with black, Hispanic, and LGBTQ+ communities. This raises numerous important questions: Is DEI already so integrated into a company’s framework, allowing these initiatives to become redundant? Will they continue to uphold diversity and inclusion without explicit policies in place? Or, was DEI largely performative—implemented to meet quotas and now quietly being abandoned in response to political pressure? Andrea Abrams, Executive Director of the progressive advocacy group Defending American Values Coalition, has voiced concern about the broader implications of DEI changes.
In a recent statement, she claimed: “President Trump’s speech confirmed what we already knew: He is intent on attacking all pathways to the American Dream that give all people the freedom to thrive in our nation and instead hoard opportunity for the privileged few. His baseless attacks on DEI are attacks on the promise of America, the promise that everyone should be able to build the life of their dreams without barriers standing in their way.”
As these policy shifts take effect, the scientific community, in the US and abroad, must navigate an uncertain landscape. The dismantling of DEI initiatives and cuts to funding does not just affect women and ethnic minorities—it threatens innovation, discovery and scientific progress itself.