Stand Up—Again!—for Federal Science Grantmaking (Deadline Aug 24, 2026)

Submit a Public Comment Directly through the SUFS portal or through the federal regulatory portal

As our June 10 newsletter and accompanying blog post described, the Office of Management and Budget in the Executive Office of the President has proposed a “Regulation for Federal Financial Assistance (OMB-2026-0034), that would subject grant applications to all federal grant-making agencies to evaluation on political before scientific criteria. The advocacy group Stand Up for Science (SUFS) responded to the OMB proposal with a call to act by July 13. SUFS reports that their Stop Vought portal helped generate over 16,000 posted comments and 27,000 calls and emails opposing OMB’s proposed rule. To those of you who contributed, thank you! As with elections, it’s the many individual actions that generate the larger message, making it harder for the administration to ignore it and easier for the courts to adjudicate it.

But now, even before OMB has evaluated those comments and finalized any decision on their proposal, the National Science Foundation, one of the agencies listed in OMB’s proposed rule, is proposing revised grantmaking guidance, NSF-2026-OTR-0001-0003, specifically to implement the OMB proposal. So we need to reiterate our opposition. Once again, we can submit comments through the SUFS portal, which provides commenting guidance and allows for tallying the number submitted, or anonymously through the federal regulatory portal. The deadline for these comments is August 24. Science thanks you!