An internal government document offers significant changes to the Oceanic and atmospheric national administration In addition to a 25% reduction in its 2026 budget, according to a project obtained by CBS News of three sources. The cuts have reached the research functions of the most difficult agency.
Under the proposal, oceanic and atmospheric research would be eliminated as a office, as well as all funding for climate, weather and ocean laboratories, cooperative institutes and several other programs, according to the document obtained by CBS News.
The memo is labeled “pre-decision”, considered as an initial proposal by the Budget and Management Office, during the supposedly “decline” process. During the “Passback”, agencies can call on decisions at the OMB, according to the Congressional Research Service.
The document project offers a reduction of $ 1.672 billion compared to the financing levels of 2025 for NoaaBy saying that “passing levels support a leaner NOAA which focuses on basic operational needs, eliminates unnecessary bureaucracy levels, ends the programs of non -essential subsidies and ends activities that do not justify a federal role”.
Current and former officials of the NOAA describe the objective of the note as “devastating”, saying that research is the backbone of the improvement of services to the public.
“When you reduce research, you have reduced the ability to improve forecasts and predictions,” the former Noaa administrator, Rick Spinrad said on Friday.
“It is not only hurricane or tornadoes. The climate side includes seasonal perspectives. So, if precipitation is used obviously by the agricultural community, the insurance and reinsurance industry wants information,” said Spinrad.
A current NOAA employee, addressing CBS News for fear of reprisals, said he was most concerned about “full contempt for the research note on earth systems for human survival”.
The national financing of weather services would remain the same, but the project proposes to move the center of space meteorological prediction, which monitors conditions such as solar eruptions And geomagnetic stormsfrom NOAA to the Department of Internal Security.
Within the Space Office, considered as a Increasing priority within the NOAAThe pass proposes to terminate the traffic coordination system for space, responsible for helping to coordinate space traffic and protect yourself against collisions. It potentially proposes to transfer “useful elements of tracss effort to a non -governmental entity”.
The Democrats of Congress also sound the alarm on the proposal.
“Trump’s budgetary plan for the NOAA is both scandalous and dangerous. They entirely destroy critical offices, such as the Oceanic and Atmospheric Research Line Office of the NOAA, which is fundamental to the agency’s mission to protect life and goods,” said representative Zoe Lofgren, Democrat of California and the classification member of the Chamber Technology.
While the sources of the NOAA say they have succeeded in the past to oppose the management and budget office during the period of “pass”, they fear that it is much more difficult to appeal under the current administration.
“No final financing decision has been made,” said OMB spokesperson Alexandra McCandless.
The White House did not respond to a request for comments.
