Press Release
Posted:
Davis, CA – Thursday, Rep. Mike Thompson (CA-04) and members of UAW Local 4811 held a listening session on campus at UC Davis to discuss the impacts federal funding cuts to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other federal agencies will have on critical health research conducted across the University of California (UC) system.
“Slashing research investments is a race to the bottom,” said Thompson. “Our UC system is top notch, with some of the best researchers in the world. That’s why last year, UC received over $4 billion in federal research funding. Cutting this funding means researchers lose jobs, our economy suffers, and we save fewer lives. Our country has long been a leader in biomedical research, and we shouldn’t be taking our foot off the gas right now. If we do, we’ll lose talented researchers and we’ll lose our standing on the world stage.”
"Academic workers at UC perform indispensable research in the public interest every day. At UC Davis, UAW 4811 members work on everything from cancer treatment to genetic disease to the future of the world’s food system. The Trump Administration’s proposed cuts to federal research funding would decimate years of progress in all these areas. We will do everything we can to stop those cuts, and we’re thankful that more and more of our elected representatives are joining workers in the fight to fully fund public research, said Dr. Ximena Anleu Gil, Postdoc, UC Davis Genome Center and Vice President, UAW Local 4811.
“Defunding research at UC Davis and at universities nationwide has very real impacts – on the lives of individuals, their communities and the country,” said Mary Croughan, provost and executive vice chancellor at UC Davis. “Research is one part of the work that universities engage in that drives economic growth while significantly improving and enhancing the lives of Americans. Advances in health care, agriculture, energy and technology are happening because of federal investments in research at our colleges and universities across the country.”
BACKGROUND
Since January, the Trump Administration has slashed federal research funding, particularly NIH funding. NIH grants make up the majority of federal research funding to our UC system. To date, the Trump Administration has cut NIH funding by $4 billion by capping indirect costs at 15 percent, which is below the congressionally appropriated minimum. Research funding from the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation has also been capped.
These caps, if applied across all federally funded research, will cost UC Davis alone more than $114 million in grants, as indirect costs fund facilities, administrative support, and protection for human subjects in clinical trials. If these caps are made permanent, universities across the UC system will have to pause or cancel research across the board. Cancer research, Alzheimer’s research, and spina bifida research at UC Davis are among the research areas that could be impacted.
These funding cuts will reverberate through our local economy, as well. Every dollar of NIH research funding in our country creates $2.46 in economic activity. When that funding is lost, so is the economic benefit it creates.
In his Presidential Budget Request for Fiscal Year 2026, President Trump has also proposed a 40 percent cut to NIH funding. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that just a 10 percent cut to NIH funding would result in two fewer drugs coming to market every year. The impacts of an even larger 40 percent cut are yet to be assessed.
Rep. Thompson signed a bipartisan appropriations letter in May alongside 165 other members requesting NIH funding be increased to $51.3 billion annually.