NIH funding cuts appear to be borrowing from the Heritage Foundation report, which exploded “DEI employees”

The 2022 report includes an analysis of 82 universities, the indirect cost rates they receive from federal grants and what they receive from private funders like the Sloan Foundation, the Gates Foundation and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative Indirect cost rate. Ten schools in the Heritage Foundation analysis did not confirm the indirect cost rate for their private funders, leaving 72 full entries in the reported analysis.

Of the 72 universities, the report claims that 67 received private research grants with zero coverage for indirect research costs, the same as the analysis and findings in the NIH notification.

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The Heritage Foundation report concluded that only three schools in the sample refused to accept the indirect cost rate of private foundations, which was lower than the tax rate negotiated with the federal government. These schools are the University of Alabama Birmingham, Massachusetts Technical College and the University of Michigan.

NIH notice refers to the same three schools without identifying the Heritage Foundation as the source of analysis. It is mentioned that Harvard requires private funders to require at least 15% indirect cost coverage, and Caltech needs to indirectly cover 20% indirect cost coverage. These examples also appear in the Heritage Foundation report.

Jay Greene, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said he was not involved in drafting the NIH notice, but did acknowledge that a paragraph from the NIH notice “is indeed a reference to our 2022 report.” NIH No response to a wired request for comment.

A plan to reduce the indirect cost rate of federal grants is also seen in the 2025 project, the nearly 1,000-page Heritage Foundation policy blueprint, for the second Trump presidency. “This market-based reform will help reduce federal taxpayers' subsidies to the left agenda,” the report reads. During his presidential campaign, Trump has always refused any links to the Heritage Foundation and the 2025 program.

A 22-state coalition filed a lawsuit on Monday challenging the legality of NIH's cuts indirect costs.

The university says the upper limit will hinder their ability to conduct important research. “Discovering new therapies will slow down, and opportunities to train the next generation of science leaders will narrow, while science and engineering in our country,” Harvard President Alan Garber wrote in an article on the university's website. Strength will be seriously damaged.”

If the new grant cap is maintained, some universities will lose more than $100 million in federal funds. Weill Cornell Medicine brings in $107 million in overhead costs in 2022, which would drop to $23 million if the interest rate is 15%.