Categories: Health

University of California researchers and patients wary of Trump’s budget cuts, even as some dollars flow in again

In August, an 80-year-old woman presented to the emergency room at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. She was lucid but suffered a stroke. Within minutes, doctors requested permission to remove the clot that caused the stroke before further brain damage occurred.

She hesitated. The procedure was part of a clinical trial, and she had heard about a federal freeze on research grants to UCLA. She wanted to know: would this study present a risk that could affect her care?

Those concerns put unnecessary pressure on a patient facing the loss of about 2 million nerve cells every minute that treatment is delayed, said Jeffrey Saver, a neurologist and longtime stroke researcher.

“Having to then worry about what’s happening with federal funding is an unnecessary increase in the stress that patients are under,” Saver said.

Patients and researchers like Saver found themselves caught in the crossfire as the Trump administration accused major universities of anti-Semitism and bias, withdrawing research funds to try to extract concessions.

Scientists who have spent their lives developing treatments for lung cancer, brain tumors and Alzheimer’s disease say scientific funding should not be politicized – and warn that patients waiting for life-saving treatments stand to lose the most. They also worry that funding cuts mired by legal challenges could discourage potential scientists from entering the field, reducing the chances of medical breakthroughs.

“I would have thought that strokes and Alzheimer’s and all of these conditions affect Democrats and Republicans alike and would be supported by everyone,” Saver said. “The reasons for the suspension do not appear to be related to the work we are doing.”

In July, the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy froze $584 million in medical and scientific research grants to UCLA after the Justice Department said the university violated the civil rights of Jewish students during pro-Palestinian protests. The Trump administration has proposed a settlement that would require UCLA to pay a $1.2 billion fine and revise campus policies on admissions, hiring and gender-affirming health care in order to restore subsidies.

Yet the federal government plays a crucial role in funding vital research that industry has little incentive to support. Saver said therapeutic discoveries made over the past 15 years have been “transformative” for stroke care. To keep eight clinical trials afloat, Saver said, he and other neurology department faculty members sought outside funding and took pay cuts. But they were close to running out before federal funds were restored.

In the emergency room, doctors told the stroke patient not to worry. Given the need to study his particular symptoms, they appealed for private donations to cover the procedure. She registered and was treated.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who has challenged President Donald Trump more directly as he builds a national profile, likened the president’s demands to extortion.

And Newsom threatened last week to “instantly” withdraw state funding from any California university that signs a Trump-proposed pact that prioritizes federal research funds to institutions that adhere to the administration’s gender definitions, limit international students and change admissions policies, among other stipulations. “California will not fund schools that betray their students, faculty, researchers and surrender academic freedom,” Newsom said in a statement.

In September, U.S. District Judge Rita Lin of the Northern District of California ordered NIH grants to flow back into the state, prompting a lawsuit initially filed by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley and the University of San Francisco in June after federal agencies cut hundreds of millions of dollars in grants to campus of the University of California.

Some private academic institutions have regained their funding by agreeing to pay hefty fines and changing their campus policies, including Columbia University, which agreed to pay $200 million, and Brown University, which agreed to $50 million. Meanwhile, last month, a federal judge ruled that the administration’s cancellation of some $2.6 billion in grants to Harvard was illegal.

Still, researchers fear the relief may be temporary. Even with the district court reinstated, the case brought by the UC researchers is still ongoing and could ultimately be decided in Trump’s favor. The White House has vowed to appeal the decision in order to restore Harvard’s funding, while increasing scrutiny of the school’s finances.

“We haven’t seen everything yet. Many scientists, researchers and people who run labs are cautious, knowing that the near future could be a little rocky,” said Jessica Levinson, a constitutional law professor at Loyola Law School. “They should feel like this is a victory, but it may be short-lived.”

Officials at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to questions about potential damage to studies while funds were frozen, or to criticism that they are wrongly politicizing money intended for potentially life-saving research.

In a statement on the administration’s campaign targeting anti-Semitism, HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon said that “we will not fund institutions that promote anti-Semitism. We will use every tool at our disposal to ensure that institutions follow the law.”

HHS spokesperson Emily Hilliard said in a follow-up statement that the department is “firm in its commitment to advancing groundbreaking biomedical research” and continues to “invest strategically in research that addresses today’s pressing challenges.”

Most of UCLA’s funding freezes basic science that doesn’t directly involve patients but has the potential to dramatically improve treatment. David Shackelford, a researcher exploring new ways to curb the growth of treatment-resistant lung cancer, said he was on the verge of a potential breakthrough in treating the disease, which kills 9 in 10 patients within five years of diagnosis.

“I’m not used to my science being politicized,” Shackelford said. “It’s cancer. We should never even have this discussion.”

As court battles play out, Democratic state lawmakers are considering placing a $23 billion bond on next year’s ballot, dedicating state funds to continued advances in cancer, stroke and infectious disease research, among other scientific research. But state bond money, if approved by voters, would fall far short of replacing federal grants, which traditionally fund the lion’s share of biomedical research.

For example, in 2024 alone, approximately $5.1 billion in NIH funding went to California, of which $3.8 billion went to universities. And the proposed bond would be one-time, broad-based funding that could fund other areas of study, such as research on climate change, marine ecosystems or wildfire prevention.

UC President James Milliken said the possibility of even deeper federal cuts for the state’s second-largest employer would have ripple effects throughout California’s economy.

While other universities sued the Trump administration, UC leaders instead engaged in a “good faith dialogue” with the Justice Department in hopes of negotiating a settlement, Milliken said.

S. Thomas Carmichael, a neurologist at UCLA, said about 55 grants totaling $23 million from the NIH, including for studies of migraines, epilepsy and autism, had been frozen in his department at the David Geffen School of Medicine. As severe as the budget cuts are, he warned about the Trump administration’s ability to attack a school’s accreditation, limit visas for international students or launch investigations.

“It’s basically a total mismatch of powers to take on the federal government,” Carmichael said. “If you don’t give in, don’t give in, you won’t win.”

Separately, in mid-September, a group of UC faculty unions and associations filed suit against the federal government, claiming the threat to research funds amounted to “financial coercion” to adopt campus policies that would restrict free speech. A hearing in the case is scheduled for December.

UCLA patient Brenda L. said she was devastated when a 2021 exam led to her diagnosis of stage 4 lung cancer at age 70. After 18 months on Tagrisso, a drug considered the gold standard for treating this particular cancer, his tumors began to grow again. (Brenda declined to provide her full name because she has not disclosed her diagnosis to some family members.)

“I just felt like it was over for me,” said Brenda, who is now 75 and lives in Bakersfield. She participated in a clinical trial and has been taking another experimental drug alongside Tagrisso for two years. This combination virtually stopped the progression of the cancer.

“I’m lucky,” said Brenda, whose ongoing trial has not been impacted. “Other patients should have the same chance.”

This article was produced by KFF Health Newswho publishes California Health Linean editorial service independent of California Health Care Foundation.