Trump fires independent board overseeing National Science Foundation

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Positions ‘terminated, effective immediately’, says email to scientists sent on president’s behalf, in move labelled ‘dangerous attack’ on US innovation

The Trump administration has fired members of an independent board that oversees the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Members of the National Science Board received an email on Friday sent from the Presidential Personnel Office “on behalf of President Donald J Trump” stating that their position was “terminated, effective immediately”.

“I wasn’t entirely surprised, to be honest,” dismissed board member Keivan Stassun said. Stassun, who works at Vanderbilt University, added that the decision was “enormously disappointing”.

The National Science Board was created in 1950 to advise the president and Congress on science and engineering policy, approve major funding awards and guide NSF’s future.

It is typically made up of 25 members appointed by the president who serve staggered, six-year terms. The fired scientists hail from academia and industry and specialise in areas including astronomy, maths, chemistry and aerospace engineering.

Every member of the current 22-person board was let go, according to terminated member Yolanda Gil. The board had planned to meet in person next week and was finalising a report on the state of US science, Gil said.

“I think this is one more indication of the sweeping changes that the administration has in mind for the NSF,” said Gil, who works at the Information Sciences Institute of the University of Southern California.

Maria Cantwell, the top Democrat on the Senate committee on commerce, science and transportation, said the move was “a dangerous attack on the institutions and expertise that drive American innovation and discovery”.

The Trump administration tried to cut the science foundation’s $9bn budget by more than half last year. Congress maintained NSF’s funding, but a similar slash is again on the table for the coming year.

Without an advisory board in the way this time, Stassun said, such cuts might be easier to execute.

It could “eviscerate investments in fundamental research and in the training of the next generation of scientists and engineers for our nation”, Stassun said.

The science foundation’s headquarters was also relocated to a smaller building. Last year, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development announced it would be moving into the NSF’s former base in Alexandria, Virginia.

The National Science Foundation directed a request for comment to the White House. In a statement, the White House said the powers given to the National Science Board when it was created might need to be updated. The science foundation’s work “continues uninterrupted”, the statement said.

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