Do scientists put themselves at risk by speaking out against the Trump administration?
“Hell yes,” said Jonathan Jackson, a national expert on increasing diversity in clinical trials who was answering the question of an audience member at the STAT Breakthrough Summit East Thursday. “I might lose the grants I have by the middle of next week” just by being on this stage, he added, an answer that silenced the crowd.
But the stakes of the current attacks on science are far too high for all researchers to not speak out, Jackson, co-founder and research director of Crescent Consulting, and other speakers argued.
Attendees were well aware of the quickly mounting impact the Trump administration has had on the nation’s scientific enterprise in just weeks, with National Institutes of Health funding largely frozen, many federal staff who work in federal science agencies terminated or put on leave, and hiring freezes and rescinded offers for graduate students rippling through universities across the nation.
“This is a full-throttle assault on health and science in this country right now,” said Melissa Simon, professor of clinical gynecology, vice chair of research in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “We can’t let them do that.”
The panelists argued that the message that the attack on science could have devastating personal effects on individuals is not getting out. “This is not ivory tower science that doesn’t affect you,” said Holly Fernandez Lynch, an associate professor of medical ethics at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. “These are cancer cures that are not going to be available. Your family is going to be affected.”
Jackson, whose work focuses on barriers marginalized communities face in entering clinical trials, said too many researchers are staying out of the fray and not speaking up as they see diversity, equity, and inclusion programs dismantled on their campuses and at their institutions. “The way they come after folks like us is the way they’re going to come after you in the days, weeks, and months ahead,” he said, urging scientists to speak up even if they don’t yet feel personally affected or attacked.
“If we just sit back and allow ourselves to shrink back in the face of darkness and denialism, then we don’t deserve the jobs that we have,” he said to loud applause from the crowd. “We are the ones who are pushing back the brink of ignorance. If you can’t do that, I don’t think you should be a scientist.”
Jackson said the Trump attack on research involving DEI would further harm marginalized communities that are already suffering because of longstanding health disparities, which have plagued the nation’s health care system. “We have to admit the system was pretty fragile and pretty performative beforehand,” he said. “We have to recognize that we hadn’t done the work.”
Simon, whose work includes increasing access to cancer screening and care for marginalized groups, said she had been directly impacted by the Trump administration’s actions. “My grant is terminated because it is harmful to the health of Americans. That is a quote from NIH on letterhead,” she said of a grant that involved minority populations. “I don’t think I’ve harmed Americans ever and that was not my intent because I’m a clinician and took the hippocratic oath not to harm anyone.”
Simon said she also had terms related to DEI scrubbed from her websites. “Last time I checked — my university, Northwestern — our values were the pursuit of knowledge and the service of truth. And woah, you’re censoring my websites?” she said. “On words I received tenure for?”
Lynch said the focus of the administration on banned words was problematic not only for its censorship but because it was slowing research. “Instead of doing the science, we’re in meetings about ‘Can I say diversity here, can I say trans-disciplinary, or is it going to be caught up in a word search?,’” she said. “We’re living in the Twilight Zone.”
“It’s so illogical. That’s part of the challenge,” she said. “How do you come up with a logical response to something that’s not driven by something that makes sense? It’s really intended to decimate science, to decimate universities, and it’s having that effect.”
Lynch said she was disappointed not to see industry and university leaders step up and speak out against the attacks on science. “What I would like to see is a more full-throated defense of university research that industry relies on,” she said. “The universities are not doing a good job coming to each others’ defense and I don’t think industry is doing a very good job coming to the defense of academia either.”
When asked by an audience member what people could do to fight back, speakers urged people to speak out and talk with their family members — to discuss the importance of science at the dinner table just as they do the price of eggs.
But when asked what hope they hold for the future, the response was more measured. “I want to be hopeful,” Lynch said. “But this is so wrong. It’s so bad.”