URBANA – President Donald Trump’s administration rescinded a freeze on federal funding Wednesday that affected a host of grant-funded initiatives, including scientific research. But some at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign remain concerned about the future of their research programs.
Francina Dominguez is a U of I hydroclimatologist who studies the effects of global warming and climate change on extreme flooding and drought events. She said she first learned about the funding freeze in an email from NASA sent to all grant recipients.
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“I was surprised,” she said. “I didn’t quite think that this would happen so quickly or so broadly… I think it shows a little bit of disarray in the administration that they would do this and send so many millions of people into panic.”
Dominguez said she’s relieved that the federal funding freeze has been rescinded, but she still worries that future decisions could negatively affect, not only her, but also her graduate students, many of whom are paid off of federal grants from the National Science Foundation, NASA, and the Department of Defense.
Earlier this week, Dominguez said she and her colleagues were feeling anxious.
“[I felt] very uncertain about what was going to happen to my research group,” she said. “And now, I guess everything is okay? Let’s wait until the next decision by the federal government, but for now, I’m relieved [and] I am glad they rescinded it.”
Dominguez’s concerns about research funding have an additional layer because of her focus on climate science, which has been under attack by the Trump administration.
“I’m, in general, just nervous about the trajectory of climate change with this new administration … it could be setting us back decades,” she said.
In FY2024, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign received $615 million in federal funding and officials say they’re doing their best to keep up with executive orders.
On Wednesday, U of I System President Tim Killeen sent an email to the U of I System community saying he and other System leaders and chancellors are working closely with the Illinois congressional delegation to “understand this evolving landscape and to continue advocating for public higher education.”
Killeen said he’ll travel to Washington D.C. next week for meetings with members of Congress and the federal relations team to “learn more about what we should anticipate and how all of us might be affected.”
Since coming into office, President Trump has issued a flurry of executive orders that have led to uncertainty for federally funded academic research programs. In response to the order, numerous federal agencies – including the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation – announced they’d be freezing federal funding and pausing review panels and other initiatives.
A letter sent from NSF to grant recipients on Tuesday said all NSF grantees must comply with executive orders “by ceasing all non-compliant grant and award activities,” which “may include, but is not limited to conferences, trainings, workshops, considerations for staffing and participant selection, and any other grant activity that uses or promotes the use of DEIA [Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility] principles and frameworks or violates Federal anti-discrimination laws.”
Late last week, U of I Chancellor Robert Jones sent an email to faculty and staff, urging them not to take action based on speculation.
U of I spokeswoman Robin Kaler said in a statement that as clarity about next steps emerges, U of I leadership will “make recommendations about how to move forward in a way that is consistent both with the law and the cornerstone values of our university.”
Illinois Student Newsroom editor Christine Herman contributed reporting.