Senator Collins Pushes Back on Trump's Plan to Control Health Research Money

Senator Susan Collins of Maine is warning the Trump administration not to let political officials control how the federal government hands out money for medical research. The National Institutes of Health, known as the NIH, gives out nearly $50 billion each year to fund studies on diseases and treatments. Collins says that politicians should not get to decide which science projects receive that funding — scientists should. Her warning comes at a tough time for her, as polls show she could be in one of the closest Senate races of her career.

Collins is a Republican, but she is pushing back against a plan reportedly being considered by her own party's president. According to The Washington Post, President Donald Trump is thinking about signing an executive order — a special directive that a president can issue without Congress — that would create a committee to review NIH grants. White House budget chief Russell Vought has argued that NIH funded 'woke' projects that go against Trump's goals. Collins says that going down that road would be wrong and harmful to science.

Collins posted a strong statement on Monday. She wrote that the Office of Management and Budget, which handles the government's money plans, 'should not be involved in agency decisions on the awards of grants.' She added that any effort to bring politics into the grant process — whether through an executive order or other guidance — goes against what Congress intended. Her main concern is that grants chosen by scientists through a fair review process would then face a second review by political appointees who might reject them for political reasons.

This fight did not start recently. Back on July 6, Collins sent a letter to budget chief Vought asking him to pull back a proposed rule that would have let senior political appointees review NIH grants after scientists had already approved them. That rule would have required officials to check whether grant awards 'demonstrably advance the President's policy priorities.' Collins argued this could shift decisions away from what is good science and toward what serves a political agenda. She also worried the rule would let agencies cancel long-running grants in the middle of important studies.

Collins warned in her July letter that cutting off grants already underway could hurt real patients. She wrote that ending clinical trials — studies that test treatments on people — 'would leave patients without treatment and could well result in significant scientific and financial losses.' She also said that researchers might stop applying for long-term federal funding if they feared their projects could be shut down at any time. That history explains why she sees the new executive order idea as part of the same ongoing fight she has been waging against the OMB for months.

Behind the scenes, there were reportedly tense conversations inside the White House. The Washington Post reported that Vought, Trump, and NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya met in the Oval Office to discuss NIH funding. Vought pushed for more political control over grants, while Bhattacharya reportedly defended the agency's current review system. An NIH spokesperson later told The New York Times that there would be 'no rescissions to NIH grant monies' — meaning the agency planned to spend every dollar that Congress had already approved for research.

Collins is not the only lawmaker concerned. Democratic Senator Patty Murray and Democratic Representative Rosa DeLauro also warned against giving the White House more power over NIH grants. Murray said in a statement that 'a single political appointee could kill a cancer study or an Alzheimer's trial with no scientific reason at all.' She said only one question should decide which research gets funded: 'Is this good science that could save lives?' Murray called on Republicans to join Democrats in opposing any effort to politicize medical research funding.

Meanwhile, Congress already took a small step to slow down the original OMB rule. A spending bill signed into law earlier this month includes a provision that temporarily blocks that rule from going into effect until December 11. Collins pointed to this in her Monday statement, arguing that any attempt to achieve the same result through an executive order would go against the wishes of Congress.

All of this is happening as Collins faces a very competitive race to keep her Senate seat. A CNN poll found Democrat Troy Jackson leading Collins 48 percent to 45 percent. A Fox News poll showed Jackson ahead by 2 points, and a University of New Hampshire poll had him leading by 3 points. Maine voters also appear to disapprove of President Trump by a wide margin — the CNN poll found that 67 percent of Mainers disapprove of Trump, while only 31 percent approve. That makes it harder for Collins to stay popular while being part of the same party as the president.

Still, Collins has shown she can win tough races before. In 2020, she won reelection even though most polls showed her losing to Democrat Sara Gideon. Maine also voted for Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris by 7 points in 2024, which shows the state leans Democratic in big elections. Whether Collins can win again by distancing herself from Trump on issues like NIH funding remains to be seen. For now, she is making clear that she will not stay quiet when she believes science is being put at risk by politics.