// NATURE NEWS — SPAZIO & SCIENZA
How the US mid-term elections could shake up science
Search author on:
PubMed
Google Scholar
Search author on:
PubMed
Google Scholar
Search author on:
PubMed
Google Scholar
The upcoming US mid-term elections could change which political party controls Congress, which meets in the US Capitol building in Washington DC.Credit: Finn Gomez/Getty
As tens of millions of voters head to the polls on 3 November to cast ballots in the US mid-term elections, a political shake-up could be coming to Washington DC — with substantial consequences for the country’s scientific landscape.
Republicans currently hold more seats than do Democrats in both chambers of the US Congress, which has given the party and administration of President Donald Trump unified control of the federal government. But polling data favour Democrats to win back the House of Representatives and suggest that they have a chance of taking control of the Senate, too.
Since Trump took office last year, his administration has terminated thousands of research grants, slashed the federal scientific workforce and sought unprecedented political oversight of science agencies such as the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the US National Science Foundation (NSF). Many researchers and science advocates hope that a new Congress will stand up to the Trump administration to protect science funding and investigate its actions. “The Republican Congress has basically ceded their role in oversight for the last almost two years,” says Shaughnessy Naughton, president of 314 Action, a political fundraising group in Washington DC, which recruits and backs Democratic scientists, engineers and health-care specialists running for office.
The Trump administration has requested deep cuts to federal science budgets for the past couple of years, asking for the NSF’s budget, for example, to be cut by more than 50% in fiscal years 2026 and 2027. Both Republican and Democratic members of Congress, which sets the federal budget, have staved off those cuts so far. But the budget for the 2027 fiscal year, which began on 1 October, has not yet been officially approved.
White House proposes vast overhaul of US science funding: what you need to know
Even if Democrats, who have been backing boosts in science spending, were to win control of both chambers of Congress, it could be difficult to push through any major funding increases, because the final budget bills must still be signed by Trump.