President Trump’s Pause of NIH Funding: PR Disguised as Politics
Why we might want to change the narrative on the effects of the current administration’s decisions
President Trump’s memo ordering a temporary pause of federal funding, effective Tuesday, January 28 at 5 pm ET, comes just days after another executive order shutting down all external communications from federal health agencies, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Since the inauguration, researchers across the US have shared stories of grant review panels, workshops, and training sessions shut down. While a pause in operations is standard during the transition period after an inauguration, the reach of the orders under the Trump administration is unprecedented and far beyond what is expected.
The NIH typically has bipartisan support; however, NPR warned of potential NIH budget cuts shortly after the election in November and highlighted the views of Robert F Kennedy Jr., President Trump’s pick for Department of Health and Human Services secretary, regarding changes to the NIH, including the immediate replacement of 600 NIH employees.
It’s no secret that the delays to NIH grant funding will have knock-on effects that won’t be fully understood until later, and researchers have been sharing the impacts of their work on the socials in an attempt to demonstrate the effects of the Republicans’ decisions. I, myself, have shared statistics, impacts, news articles, and others’ personal stories highlighting what is happening in a somewhat futile effort to highlight that This Is Bad.
But it’s not lost on me that the very things we are bringing to the forefront as issues are considered by the people we need to reach the most to be features, not bugs, in the current administration’s approach. President Trump (and I mean this in no way as an endorsement) is a PR mastermind—at least, his team is—and shutting down scientific research, diversity initiatives, etc., will appear to be achieving the goals so many people voted for, such as getting rid of “Big Government”, protecting the US from ‘globalism’, and addressing issues with gender ideology and critical race theory. These effects we’re highlighting? They’re promises delivered, not disasters. The President is Getting Things Done, and his voters are happy about it.
The dismantling of DEI and the pause in NIH funding disbursement are directly linked. One goal of pausing grants is to go through them all and remove DEI-associated funding opportunities and DEI language. The administration’s approach speaks to those who voted for the goals mentioned above. They wanted this. They wanted the effects we’re using as evidence that the actions are wrong. Showing someone something they want will never help them see that it’s bad.
It’s time to be strategic… because this issue isn’t political.
(Hear me out before you stop reading, please!)
President Trump is pulling a power move, and it’s a PR stunt. One that has broad-reaching effects on government, policies, and politics, yes, but at its core, it’s still a PR stunt. Why? Because PR for power is how Trump has attracted, grown, and kept his base since he first ran for President in 2016. He is strongly motivated by gaining power and getting people to like him while he does it. This is his character, and he doesn’t hide it. Trump is not misunderstood by his voters—they know what he is doing, and they like it. He is also quite effective in taking action in a way that convinces his voters that he’s doing something about the issues they care about. He is (again, not an endorsement) quite an innovative communicator and an example of someone who shows strength and power in a way that appeals to people who have neither and want more. We tend to be drawn to people we aspire to be like, and a person who is willing to run for President and put everything into that while also facing criminal prosecution and other legal challenges demonstrates an almost unhuman level of self-confidence and psychological durability. That’s something people want. It’s something people look up to.
This issue isn’t political in the traditional sense because it’s a person gaining power using politics as a platform and PR as a tactic. One way to get through to people, if it’s possible at all, is to take the politics out of the equation, bring humanity in, then appeal to the exact aspects of character that Trump appeals to.
When we attack something a person likes and actively wants, they’re immediately on the defensive. Logic and reason don’t work as arguments when each side has a different idea of what is logical and reasonable. And with the serious effects that the current decisions could have on research and, as a consequence, health within society overall, it’s not enough to have the people who already agree that these are bad decisions fighting against them. We need the people who support the decisions to see through the cracks and recognize that the promises that are being fulfilled aren’t actually being fulfilled or delivering a better life alongside them.
So yes, cutting funding for DEI-focused research projects has a devastating effect on millions of people. Delaying grants might cause labs to shut down and researchers to lose their jobs. But those who support the cuts don’t care about that. What might they care about?
Let’s say 10 years from now, their daughter develops a rare cancer, and there’s a treatment available… but it doesn’t work very well in girls because the researchers only used male mice in preclinical studies, and only 5% of clinical trial patients were female. The effect difference wasn’t observed until doctors noticed it after the drug was approved. Sure, researchers are trying to make it work better in females now, but the new treatment won’t be ready in time to save their child.
Or their elderly mom develops Alzheimer’s, and a treatment that could have helped her was set to go into clinical trials this year, but the researcher behind it decided to take early retirement after his team all decided to leave research for a more stable career that government decisions can’t take away.
Maybe their wife can’t access care while giving birth and experiences complications because the foreign doctors at the only hospital in their area left the country over fears of being attacked, and there weren’t enough American ones to replace them because DEI initiative cuts reduced medical school enrollment. Or their child is born intersex and there’s no specific care available to help them because a person can only legally be one sex or the other.
They don’t want these things to happen? Emphasize that they have the power to create change. Appeal to the mental resilience within them—the strength in admitting that you’ve changed your mind because you’ve gained new information that you relate to.
The goal is to highlight that while the current administration’s policies appear to be doing something about issues Trump voters care about, the actions being taken aren’t addressing them at all and are, in fact, creating new issues that will have a much greater direct effect on them on individual level than anything that existed before.
I haven’t given up on people yet and believe that, with sufficient appeal to emotion and demonstrations of real effects on individual people’s lives, strong support of Trump’s damaging policies can be redirected over time toward something that might not result in both sides agreeing, but at least in steps in the direction of united approaches.
On a broader scale, we can talk about things that demonstrate how the wide-reaching policies on things like immigration, gender issues, and health research etc., have effects that actively go against the things that Republican voters value. A leader who prioritizes integrity and stability fosters individual liberty, personal accountability, fiscal responsibility, and an environment that promotes prosperity. One who appeals to individuals who value these things through carefully worded promises then takes action in a way that appears to be embodying the same values while simultaneously undermining them all can only be stopped if the people who believe in him recognize that their values are being undermined on a personal, not political, level.