Prioritizing AI, robotics, and nuclear energy: Trump administration is guiding research funding away from independent universities to private companies
President Trump’s science adviser told lawmakers on [July 22, 2026] that the Trump administration intended to drastically overhaul the country’s approach to scientific research, including by shifting research funding away from universities toward individual researchers and private companies.
At a House hearing, Michael Kratsios echoed points he laid out in a report … titled “Science: A New Golden Age.” He said the administration would prioritize artificial intelligence, robotics and nuclear energy while reducing the government’s focus on what he called “life sciences.”
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Democrats countered that the Trump administration had harmed scientific research by firing staff members at federal science agencies, seeking deep cuts to research programs, canceling or freezing grants, punishing universities that Mr. Trump is unhappy with, and pushing some of the best researchers in the United States to relocate to other countries.
“Let me propose an alternative title: ‘Unleashing the Golden Age of Science in the People’s Republic of China,’” Representative Zoe Lofgren of California, the top Democrat on the House science committee, told Mr. Kratsios at the start of the hearing. “This administration has been systematically destroying the U.S. science enterprise.”
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