Trump Executive Order Expected to Create NIH Grant Board with Veto Power Over Research Funding

PITTSBURGH — President Trump is expected to sign an executive order establishing a board with authority to approve or veto National Institutes of Health grant funding, the Guardian reported Sunday, marking another attempt to bring NIH spending under White House control.

The order was discussed at a Friday meeting where senior administration officials accused the NIH of funding "woke" initiatives that conflicted with the president's political priorities, according to people who spoke to the Washington Post on condition of anonymity.

Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, and other officials proposed creating an external committee that could veto awards in biomedical research that do not align with Trump's goals, Politico reported. The board would include Vought and NIH director Jay Bhattacharya and would be required to reach unanimous decisions on grant awards.

Establishing an external commission to award grants based on ideological alignment breaks with the NIH's traditional process of evaluating proposals on scientific merit alone. Bhattacharya has resisted cuts to federal research spending and defended the NIH's grant-making process on Friday, while Vought has expressed a desire to reshape federal spending.

The reported move comes as the NIH, the world's largest public funder of biomedical research, faces a class-action lawsuit filed this month by researchers arguing that the Trump administration is hindering and terminating scientific grants to censor opposing viewpoints. The ACLU lawsuit argues the administration is violating the First Amendment by using federal funding power to target disfavored viewpoints within the biomedical research community.

"What the First Amendment does not allow is the government's use of its funding power to target or silence the expression of disfavored viewpoints within the biomedical research community," reads the lawsuit.

Since Trump took office for his second term, billions of dollars in federal grants related to health, nutrition, the environment, and disaster relief have been cut or frozen. Research with keywords including "equity," "racist," "gender," and "climate change" has been flagged by the administration to hinder funding for scientific research, according to the Guardian and Nature.

The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the NIH, and the White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Reporting by The Guardian, with reporting by the Washington Post and Politico. Read the original report: Trump reportedly to form health funding board that could veto 'woke' initiatives.