Staff at the National Institutes of Health have been instructed to freeze all agency funding awarded to Brown and several other institutions, according to one internal NIH email reviewed and verified by The Herald and obtained via an agency employee, as well as another internal NIH email shared by a journalist at Nature.
The other impacted institutions listed on the email obtained by The Herald were Columbia, Cornell, Harvard and Northwestern University. The NIH employee who provided the email was granted anonymity for fear of retaliation.
The email instructed employees not to “provide any communication to these schools about whether or why the funds are frozen.” The message did not provide a reason for the freeze.
University Spokesperson Brian Clark said that Brown has yet to receive any official notice of the freeze.
When asked about the freeze, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Press Secretary Emily Hilliard wrote “HHS does not comment on ongoing investigations” in an email to The Herald.
This comes as the entire University has also been placed under investigation by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services over alleged violations of Title VI. The White House previously confirmed a $510 million planned funding freeze to Brown.
The email seems to continue the government’s pattern of wielding NIH research money as a tool to target entire institutions. Previously, NIH grant terminations have been justified by the Trump administration as preventing tax dollars from being spent on research related to the LGBTQ+ community and diversity, equity and inclusion, as the administration says they no longer meet “agency priorities.”
As of Friday afternoon, at least $9 million in research grants at Brown had been terminated by the Trump administration, due to gender- and diversity-related terminology. The cuts have caused researchers to lay off some of their staff and has left some participants without treatment, The Herald previously reported.
On Monday, Brown, along with eight other universities, filed a lawsuit against the Department of Energy, following planned funding cuts in administrative “indirect costs,” which would lead to over $2 million annual loss for Brown. The lawsuit described the funding cuts as “flagrantly unlawful,” adding that it would “devastate scientific research.”
President Christina Paxson P’19 P’MD’20 has repeatedly affirmed the University’s commitment to “academic freedom” in the wake of recent federal actions.
Elise Haulund is a science & research editor and sophomore from Redondo Beach, CA. Concentrating in English and biology, she has a passion for exploring the intersection between STEM and the humanities. Outside of writing, researching and editing, she enjoys ballet-dancing, cafe-hopping and bullet-journaling.
Claire Song is a university news and science & research editor for The Herald. She is a sophomore from California studying Applied Math-Biology. She likes to drink boba in her free time.
