Science Policy This Week: September 15, 2025

What’s Ahead

NASA’s headquarters in Washington, DC.

NASA

NASA bars Chinese nationals from agency work

NASA reportedly has barred Chinese nationals, even those with U.S. visas, from working on its programs due to national security concerns. The move, first reported last week by Bloomberg, appears to expand existing restrictions on interactions with Chinese nationals to cover students and contractors involved in research. Affected individuals were locked out of IT systems and prevented from attending meetings starting Sept. 5, according to anonymous sources who spoke to Bloomberg. Asked by FYI for details on the new restrictions and the number of people it impacts, a NASA spokesperson said only that the agency “has taken internal action pertaining to Chinese nationals, including restricting physical and cybersecurity access to our facilities, materials, and network to ensure the security of our work.”

Who should have access to federal research facilities has been the subject of much debate in recent years, with several members of Congress pushing for tighter security restrictions for citizens of countries deemed to be national security threats. Last year, for example, Congress restricted access to the Department of Energy’s nuclear security labs – prohibiting citizens of China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea from accessing non-public areas unless they secure a waiver.

The decision to restrict access to NASA facilities also comes as the Trump administration attempts to squash union representation at NASA and reframe the space agency as a national security agency. An Aug. 29 executive order states that “intelligence, counterintelligence, investigative, or national security work” is a primary function of NASA, excluding the agency from the Federal Labor Management Relations Program.

In response to the executive order, NASA plans to bar the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE) and the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) from exclusively representing NASA employees and cancel all active union negotiations and agreements, according to NASA Watch. The unions have pledged to fight back in court, and Democrats in Congress have also spoken out against the order.

Senate to vote on slate of science agency nominees

The Senate plans to vote this week on a bloc of nominees that includes President Donald Trump’s picks for several key science positions, such as:

Darío Gil to be under secretary of science at the Department of Energy;
Brandon Williams to lead the National Nuclear Security Administration;
Scott Pappano to be the deputy NNSA administrator;
Matthew Napoli to lead NNSA’s nonproliferation programs;
Theodore Garrish to lead DOE’s Office of Nuclear Energy;
Kyle Haustveit to lead DOE’s Office of Fossil Energy;
Conner Prochaska to be director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy;
Andrea Travnicek to be assistant secretary for water and science at the Department of the Interior; and
John Squires to lead the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Senate Republicans modified the rules governing nominations last week so that certain types of nominees can be confirmed in groups, instead of one at a time. Senate Democrats have criticized the change, saying it will undermine oversight of Trump’s nominees. Democrats had been using the old rules to severely slow down votes on Trump’s nominees, a strategy used by both parties in the past.

A byproduct of the rules change is that the Senate Commerce Committee will revote this week on Trump’s nominee to lead the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Neil Jacobs. The change in nomination rules necessitates holding a new vote on Jacobs to avoid a potential procedural challenge to the way the first vote was conducted. The revote will occur at a nomination hearing for Ethan Klein to be an associate director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

NSF grants remain cut, Harvard expecting reinstatements

National Science Foundation grant cuts can remain in place while a lawsuit brought by researchers progresses, the D.C. district court ruled last week. The court found that it did not have jurisdiction to hear challenges to the grant terminations, citing previous court decisions such as the recent Supreme Court order halting reinstatement of National Institutes of Health grants. Furthermore, the court was unconvinced by the arguments that NSF’s change in priorities is illegal and found that the damage to plaintiffs of submitting grant proposals “that will not receive fair consideration in the grant selection process” did not require immediate relief.

Meanwhile, Harvard University said last week that it has started receiving grant reinstatement notices after the Massachusetts district court ordered the government to reverse more than $2.6 billion in federal funding cuts. Similarly to the D.C. court, the Massachusetts court found that it lacked jurisdiction over the “arbitrary and capricious” challenges to the grant termination letters. However, it added that it had jurisdiction over other claims from the plaintiffs, such as the government’s infringement upon the free speech rights of Harvard and its employees, that the Court of Federal Claims cannot fully adjudicate. “What is fundamentally at issue is a bedrock constitutional principle rather than the interpretation of contract terms,” Judge Allison Burroughs wrote in the decision.

It is unclear whether any NIH grants have been re-terminated following the Supreme Court order, though an NIH legal adviser wrote an email strongly recommending against re-terminating the almost 900 grants reinstated in June, according to Science. The email further suggested that grant terminations will be more defensible after the 2026 fiscal year begins on Oct. 1 because HHS grants will be subject to new conditions, including termination for “nonalignment with agency priorities.”

Also on our radar

The House CCP Committee released reports identifying “shortfalls” in DOD’s research security policies and investigating partnerships between U.S. and Chinese universities. The House version of the NDAA, which the chamber passed last week, includes related provisions to prohibit certain federal funding for researchers or universities who work with “foreign adversary-controlled entities that pose a national security risk” and require enhanced disclosure of foreign adversary collaborations and affiliations.
The Education Department announced it will end funding for several minority-serving institution grant programs, including the Minority Science and Engineering Improvement program.
California legislators have introduced a proposal to fund scientific research using $23 billion in voter-approved bonds.
The House Science Committee will hold a hearing on fusion energy on Thursday with witnesses from industry, national labs, and academia.
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