White House Grant Rule Would Let Politics Decide Research Funding

Federal grantmaking has always rested on a basic division of responsibility. Congress decides which public purposes deserve funding. Agencies translate those laws into programs. Scientists, subject-matter experts, and career officials evaluate which applications are most likely to succeed.

Politics helps set the priorities – democratic elections select members of Congress who broadly decide what topics deserve attention and appropriate taxpayer dollars to research focused on those areas. Until recently, the federal agencies that actually spend the federal dollars and implement those grants have been more or less neutral and apolitical. Partisan politics has not played a role in deciding which rural health program, community organization, or research university receives a grant. Cancer studies and weather forecasting models have not been ideologically vetted to ensure they will produce results consistent with the White House's messaging before they can be used in a federal study.

The White House's recently proposed "Uniform Grants Regulation" would blur that line almost beyond recognition. Unveiled by the Office of Management and Budget on May 29, the proposal would transform OMB's government-wide guidance into a binding regulation and dramatically expand the role of political appointees in awarding and terminating discretionary grants.

This is part of a wider assault on research under the guise of "oversight" and preventing waste. On August 7, 2025, the White House issued Executive Order 14332 which directed that a political appointee be involved in the grant approval process which had traditionally been managed by non-political technical experts. Additionally, the EO forbid grants to be approved "to fund, promote, encourage, subsidize, or facilitate" various ill-defined and amorphous topics. Instead of "streamlining" grantmaking, the new EO has resulted in more bureaucracy, slower application reviews, and more uncertainty by grant recipients.

The new OMB proposal goes even further. Senior appointees or their designees would conduct pre-award reviews and would be instructed not to " routinely defer " to peer reviewers. Those appointees would instead exercise independent judgment, including by deciding whether an award " demonstrably advance[s] the President's policy priorities. "

Federal research grants should be about finding the truth using the best available science, not about advancing a political agenda.

Expert panels would still exist, but only in an advisory role. Political officials, rather than the people best equipped to evaluate a project's methods, originality, and feasibility, would be the primary decision-makers determining which grant proposals are approved and which are denied.

That is troubling enough at the front end. The proposal is even more concerning after a grant has been awarded.

Agencies could add conditions during an award's period of performance based on agency risk determinations. Future awards would also have to permit termination if they no longer serve federal agency priorities or the " national interest " as those concepts exist at the time of termination. The executive order behind the proposal separately directs agencies, where legally possible, to revise existing discretionary grants to permit immediate termination on those grounds.

A project could satisfy every requirement announced when it applied, survive expert review, hire staff, enroll patients, purchase equipment, and begin work – only to lose funding because political priorities later changed.

That is not responsible oversight. It is a recipe for arbitrary government and a politicization of federal science agencies.

Research does not operate on an election calendar. Clinical trials can take years. Long-term studies depend on consistent data collection. Laboratories hire researchers based on multi-year commitments. Local governments enter contracts, nonprofits build programs, and universities make investments in reasonable reliance on federal awards.

Fiscally, the proposal is irresponsible. Canceling a grant midway through will not recover the dollars already spent. It often wastes those dollars by ensuring that the project never produces a usable result.

The chilling effect may be worse. Researchers will avoid subjects that could become politically inconvenient. Universities will hesitate to begin ambitious projects if funding can disappear with the next ideological directive. Applicants will write proposals not to answer important questions, but to anticipate what a political appointee wants to hear.

Science organized around pleasing the White House is not "gold standard science." It is patronage with a lab coat.

The centralization is equally concerning. OMB proposes to make its rules automatically binding government-wide, without separate agency rulemakings, and agencies would need OMB approval for class-wide exceptions from the termination requirement. That would give the White House budget office extraordinary leverage over agencies whose missions and expertise differ enormously.

Congress holds the power of the purse. The executive branch administers the programs Congress creates. OMB may promote consistent grant management, but it should not become a political clearinghouse that converts lawful appropriations into an ideological loyalty test.

Expert review should remain central to merit-based selection. Termination should be tied to fraud, noncompliance, failure to perform, or a clear statutory basis – not a newly announced political preference. Recipients should receive meaningful reasons and a genuine opportunity to challenge arbitrary decisions.

Federal funding decisions should reflect the best scientific advice. They should never depend on passing an ideological purity test or personal loyalty to the President's agenda.

Nicholas Monck chairs the American Bar Association Young Lawyers Division's Government, Military, and Public Sector Lawyers Committee. Opinions expressed are his own and do not represent the views of his employer.