Executive Branch News
Latest from the White House
As previously reported, the Trump Administration has from day one been issuing a dizzying number of executive actions, some whose legality remain in question. Below are some of the latest developments coming out of the White House. Federal Workforce Last week, as part of an Executive Order on âworkforce optimization,â the Presidentâs Office of Personnel Management directed federal agencies to fire âtrial and probationaryâ employees, providing little other guidance on how to do it. Typically, probationary employees are those within 1-3 years of service in their position. Democratic lawmakers and government worker unions are pushing back, arguing the long-term damage that…
President Trump Rescinds Executive Orders Impacting Executive Personnel Ethics Commitments and Census Parameters
On January 20, 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14148 rescinding a series of âHarmful Executive Orders and Actionsâ of the Biden Administration, including provisions affecting federal ethics and the census count. President Bidenâs Executive Order 13989 required every executive agency appointee to sign an ethics pledge. This commitment prohibited appointeesâ connections with lobbyist activities such as receiving gifts and leveraging the ârevolving doorâ status of their position to later secure more favorable private and foreign job prospects, until at least two years after their service. Revoking these guidelines, Trump has aligned with his first-term actions, having issued his own 2017 Ethics Commitments before removing those…
Dorothy Fink Chosen to Serve as Acting HHS Secretary; Appoints Matthew Memoli as Acting NIH Director
Dorothy Fink M.D. has been appointed by President Trump to serve as acting Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) as confirmation hearings for the presidential nominee for the position, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., continue. Fink previously served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Women’s Health and Director of the Office on Women’s Health in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health (OASH). Shortly after her appointment, Fink tapped Matthew Memoli, M.D., to serve as acting Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) as the Senate works to confirm Jay Bhattacharya (see previous COSSA coverage). Memoli, a National Institute of Allergy and…
Trump Signs Executive Order Dismantling DEI Initiatives in Federal Agencies
On January 21, President Trump signed the Executive Order (EO), Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity. The EO makes bold claims that the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts of past administrations violates the Civil Rights Act of 1964 through adopting âdangerous, demeaning, and immoral race- and sex-based preferencesâ that have hindered opportunity for certain groups. This EO has resulted in a massive scale back of DEI initiatives across the federal agencies and the optional scale back of DEI initiatives across U.S. businesses. The directive requires federal agencies to place all federal DEI staff on paid leave with the intent of being…
Executive Action Affecting Federal Agencies
Since President Trump was sworn into office on January 20, several executive actions have been taken that have impacted social and behavioral science (SBS) research, including freezes on hiring federal workers and requiring federal workers to return to the office, a halt on all communications, spending, and travel within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and a memorandum from the White House Office of Budget and Management (OMB) instituting a freeze on federal spending across agencies that was rescinded two days later. As previously reported by COSSA, President Trump signed two Executive Orders (EO) implementing a hiring freeze…
Census Bureau Director Rob Santos Tenders Resignation
On January 30, Census Bureau Director Robert Santos resigned three years into his five-year term. His resignation comes after the House Oversight Committee held a hearing on the Census Bureau on December 5 which largely focused on whether the 2030 Census should include a citizenship question and President Trumpâs recent rescission of the Biden Administrationâs Executive Order (EO) affirming that the census should count all people, not only citizens, as per the 14th Amendment (see previous COSSA coverage). As a reminder, during his first-term, the Trump Administration attempted to add a citizenship question to the decennial census only for the Supreme Court to…
Nominations Open for Distinguished Lecturer at the 18th Matilda White Riley Honors
The Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research (OBSSR) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is accepting nominations for an outstanding social-behavioral scientist as candidates for Distinguished Lecturer at the 18th Matilda White Riley Honors. The Matilda White Riley Honors are an annual event recognizing transformative work in the fields of social and behavioral science along with early-career researchers. Nominees should have a research career that has âadvanced behavioral and social scientific knowledge in areas within NIHâs mission and that expands upon Dr. White Rileyâs work.â Nominees need not have NIH funding. More information is available on the OBSSR website. Nominee…
President Trump Signs First-Day Executive Orders to End Work from Home Policies and Freeze Hiring for Federal Work Force
On January 20, President Trump, in a series of first-day executive actions, signed an Executive Order (EO) titled “Return to In-Person Work” that requires all federal workers to return to in-person work âas soon as practicableâ. This decision comes after the House Oversight Committee held a hearing on The Stay-at-Home Federal Workforce: Another Biden-Harris Legacy on January 15 to investigate the implications of the federal work from home policy. During the hearing, Republican members of the committee expressed concerns that federal policies like the work from home policy were infringing on the power of the Presidential Administration, a concern that has been…
OSTP Issues Anti-Harassment Guidelines for Federal Agencies
In the final days of the Biden Administration, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) released Guidelines for Federal Research Agencies to Reduce Sex-Based and Sexual Harassment Involving Award Personnel in response to the Chips and Science Act of 2022 (see previous COSSA coverage). These guidelines include identifying and removing gaps in current sexual harassment policies, improving consistency of policies across federal agencies, and promoting data transparency to support evidence-based policies. In addition to the guidelines presented, the report recommends that legislation be passed to support anti-harassment objectives, including authority for federal agencies to develop a consistent definition of harassment, a…
White House Awards National Medal of Science to Political Scientist
At the beginning of January, President Biden announced the latest recipients of the National Medal of Science and the National Medal of Technology and Innovation, the nationâs highest honors in science, engineering, and technology. Both awards were presented at a joint ceremony. Among the recipients of the National Medal of Science was Political Scientist Dr. Martin Larry Bartels, âfor thought leadership that promotes democracy around the world,â according to his award citation. Bartels, Princetonâs Donald E. Stokes Professor in Public and International Affairs, Emeritus, and an emeritus professor of politics, was on the Princeton faculty from 1991 to 2011. He then transferred…
NIH Releases Public Access Plan and RFI for Research Findability and Transparency
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has released the final version of its public access policy in response to the August 2022 memorandum issued by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). The memorandum announced new requirements for federal agencies to make peer-reviewed publications resulting from federal funding freely available to the public immediately following publication (see previous COSSA coverage). The new policy, finalized from the draft released in June 2024 (see previous COSSA coverage), is set to take effect on December 31, 2025, and provides clarification on the definitions of Article, Manuscript, Final Published Article, Official Date of…
Trump Announces Appointments to Science Team
On December 22, President-elect Trump announced on Truth Social his picks for top White House science positions. Michael Kratsios, an alum of the first Trump Administration, will be nominated as Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). Kratsios previously served as Trumpâs Chief Technology Officer and later as Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering in DOD. Kratsios will also serve as Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, known commonly as the Presidentâs Science Advisor. The OSTP position requires Senate confirmation, but the Science Advisor does not. Kratsios holds a BA in politics from…
President-Elect Trump Nominates Dr. Jay Bhattacharya to Lead NIH
President-elect Donald Trump has nominated Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of health policy at Stanford University, as the Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Notably, Bhattacharya was a critic of the governmentâs handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and was the plaintiff in the Supreme Court case, Murthy v. Missouri, where he argued that he was âunfairly censoredâ on social media by the government for his views on the issue. While the case gained national attention, it was ultimately unsuccessful in a 6-3 ruling. About the nomination, Trump said, âDr. Bhattacharya will work in cooperation with Robert F. Kennedy Jr….
Trump Names David Sacks as AI Czar/PCAST Head
On December 4, President-elect Trump announced his plan to appoint tech venture capitalist and PayPal cofounder David Sacks to a new âAI czarâ position and advisor on cryptocurrency in the next Administration. The announcement also states that Sacks will lead the Presidentâs Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST). While little more detail is known about Trumpâs plan for PCAST, the naming of Sacks as chair signals that the council will be maintained in Trumpâs second term. This is notable particularly because during Trumpâs first term, PCAST was not reconstituted until almost three years into his term. This is a developing story.
OSTPâs CoSTEM Releases Five-Year Federal Strategic Plan Advancing STEM Education and Cultivating STEM Talent
The White House Office of Science and Technology Policyâs (OSTP) National Science and Technology Councilâs (NSTC) Committee on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (CoSTEM) has released the Federal Strategic Plan Advancing STEM Education and Cultivating STEM Talent. The five-year plan is intended to promote STEM education and careers, particularly in coordination with multi-sector collaborators throughout the STEM ecosystem and has identified three principles to achieve this goal, including expanding opportunity, developing partnerships and the ecosystem, and fostering transparency and accountability. Within these principles, OSTP has identified five pillars including STEM engagement; STEM teaching and learning; STEM workforce; STEM research and innovation capacity; and…
NSF Releases NAIRR Dear Colleague Letter for AI Research and Education
On November 15, the National Science Foundationâs (NSF) National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR) Pilot released a Dear Colleague letter seeking datasets to âenable a broader set of researchers and educationsâ in artificial intelligence (AI) and foster the development of AI skills in educational environments (see previous COSSA coverage here). The deadline to submit datasets is February 7 and can be submitted here. Full details about the submission criteria and evaluation can be found here.
House Oversight Probes Biden-Harris Administrationâs Scientific Integrity Committees
On November 14, House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer (R-KY) announced an investigation into the Biden-Harris Administrationâs scientific integrity committees, including for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Comer cited concerns of interference of the âexecutive agency of future presidential administrationsâ through the Biden-Harris Administrationâs Presidential Memorandum directing the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) to develop a Task Force on Scientific Integrity and federal agencies to produce scientific integrity reports (see previous COSSA coverage here). In letters sent to the EPA and HHS, Comer requested information on the…
Deadline Extended: NSF Seeking Input on Research Ethics
In September, the National Science Foundation (NSF) issued a Dear Colleague Letter requesting public input into the agencyâs efforts to improve its merit review process to mitigate the potential harms of emerging technologies as required by the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022. The deadline for the Request for Information (RFI) has been extended to December 13 in response to feedback requesting more time. The RFI contains several guiding questions to assist with public response, such as: âDescribe ethical, social, safety, and/or security risks from current or emerging research activities that you believe might be of concern to the community, profession, or organization…
BLS and Census Bureau Pause Decrease in CPS Sample Size Following Friends of BLS Letter
As previously reported by COSSA, the Friends of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) coalition sent a letter urging the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to modernize the Current Population Survey (CPS) with additional funding in FY 2025. On October 29, BLS and the Census Bureau, who jointly sponsor the survey, announced that they have paused intent to decrease the CPS sample size in January 2025. A $6 million anomaly in the continuing resolution (CR) passed by Congress in late September (see previous COSSA coverage here) was provided to fund the sample size assuming the funding remains in any final bills or future CRâs passed by Congress…
Social Scientists, STEM Education Experts to Join National Science Board
On October 15, President Biden announced his intent to appoint the newest class of National Science Board members, which includes sociologist and former White House official Alondra Nelson. The National Science Board (NSB) is the policy-making body of the National Science Foundation (NSF) that also serves as an independent advisor to the President and Congress on federal science policy. The board consists of 24 members who serve staggered six-year terms and new members are appointed by the President. Alondra Nelson is a sociologist who served as the first Deputy Director for Science and Society at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP)…