The US National Science Foundation (NSF) has halted all new research grants, a directive that seems to have been mandated by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). This new initiative, spearheaded by billionaire Elon Musk, aims to slash government spending and reduce federal workforce.

DOGE is currently scrutinizing a list of existing research grants that were evaluated by the NSF in February for their focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). More than 200 of these grants are under consideration for cancellation, according to NSF personnel who spoke to Nature.

This past Monday, three DOGE representatives made their way to the NSF’s main office in Alexandria, Virginia. According to NSF staff, DOGE has ordered that numerous research proposals, already approved through a rigorous multi-tiered review process but not yet finalized, be returned to NSF program officers. These officers have been instructed to undertake “mitigation work,” although specific details were not provided. Science magazine first reported DOGE’s arrival at NSF earlier this week.

Supporting Science Journalism

If you appreciate this content, please consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. Your subscription helps sustain the future of journalism that brings to light transformative ideas and discoveries shaping our world.

With a budget of $9 billion, the NSF stands as one of the world’s leading funders of fundamental research. Since the onset of Donald Trump’s second term as U.S. President, the agency has experienced dramatic shifts: it temporarily halted all grant disbursements, then resumed them in February by court mandate; it dismissed its probationary staff in February, only to rehire half shortly thereafter. Just this month, it halved its graduate research fellowship program, now offering only 1,000 positions compared to the typical 2,000.

The NSF has come under intense scrutiny following an October 2024 report from the office of Ted Cruz, a Republican senator from Texas and current chair of the Senate Science Committee. The report criticized 3,483 NSF grants issued from January 2021 to April 2024—during the administration of Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden—as funding “questionable projects that promoted DEI principles,” allegedly wasting $2 billion. In response, Democrats on the Science, Space, and Technology Committee in the US House of Representatives have challenged the Cruz report, claiming it contains significant errors and threatens both economic and national security by undermining vital scientific work.

An NSF spokesperson stated that the foundation is “continuing to issue awards” but declined to respond to inquiries from Nature. White House spokesperson Kush Desai remarked that the Trump administration is dedicated to aligning federal research expenditures with the priorities of the general American populace. Senator Cruz’s office has not yet replied to requests for comment from Nature.

To gain deeper insights into the ongoing situation at the NSF, Nature consulted with five anonymous staff members, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The Arrival of DOGE

While DOGE has been visiting various US agencies over the past couple of months, with some facing complete dissolution, NSF staff anxiously awaited their turn. This Wednesday, attention shifted to scrutinizing the NSF’s grants. According to documents obtained by Nature, two DOGE members, Luke Farritor and Zachary Terrell, accessed the grant management systems and blocked funding for grants that had been approved but were pending final steps. “This development is particularly alarming,” an NSF program officer commented.

NSF research projects undergo several phases before approval. Initial proposals are reviewed by NSF program officers specializing in the relevant scientific field. These proposals are then evaluated by independent experts outside the agency, with only the most meritorious moving forward—typically 20% to 30% of submissions. Final approval is given by division directors at the NSF before being processed by the Division of Grants and Agreements, where they are now being returned from.

Historically, proposals that gain final approval are almost always funded. However, NSF employees revealed that since DOGE’s intervention, the pace of new research awards had already halved compared to 2024, and by April 16, they had ceased altogether.

Controversy Over a Critical Report

Since Trump’s return to office, the NSF has revisited its grants in light of executive orders against DEI programs deemed “radical and wasteful” and “gender ideology.” In February, the agency began scrutinizing grants for any of several hundred terms that the Cruz report associated with leftist ideologies rather than solid science, such as “women”, “black men”, and “inequality”. Since 1980, it has been part of NSF’s mission, mandated by the US Congress, to increase participation from underrepresented groups in science.

The House analysis criticized the Cruz report for inappropriately targeting grants at minority-serving institutions and for containing numerous errors, including flagging grants unrelated to DEI initiatives, such as those studying the genomic diversity of rice and female leopard seals. It also noted that 14% of the 3,483 grants were duplicates, resulting in them being counted multiple times.

Zoe Lofgren, a US representative from California and the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, sent the analysis to NSF director Sethuraman Panchanathan today. She emphasized the importance of not letting the NSF be swayed by the “baseless conclusions” of the Cruz report, which could compromise its merit review process.

Most grants were flagged simply because they included references to the “broader impacts” of the research on society, a requirement unanimously passed by the Senate in 2010, before Cruz’s tenure, and reaffirmed in 2017. Anthony Gitter, a computational biologist at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, had his grant on using deep learning for protein modeling flagged merely for mentioning summer research opportunities for underrepresented minorities in his broader impact statement. According to Gitter, the Cruz report perpetuates the misconception that universities are elitist institutions that stray from true scientific endeavors. “However, this narrative is completely out of step with the actual data,” he contends.

This article is reproduced with permission and was first published on April 17, 2025.