The US government is withdrawing grants and other support for research that even references the climate crisis, academics have said, amid Donald Trump’s blitzkrieg upon environmental regulations and clean-energy development.
Trump, who has said that the climate crisis is a “giant hoax”, has already stripped mentions of climate change and global heating from government websites and ordered a halt to programs that reference diversity, equity and inclusion.
One environmental scientist working in the western US who did not want to be named said their previously awarded grant from the Department of Transportation for climate-adaption research had been withdrawn, until they retitled it to remove the word “climate”.
Kaarle Hämeri, chancellor of the University of Helsinki in Finland, said the descriptions for Fulbright grants had been changed to remove or alter the words “climate change”, as well as “equitable society”, “inclusive societies” and “women in society”.
The administration’s animus towards climate research has even extended overseas via the US’s Fulbright exchange program, which offers about 8,000 grants a year to American and foreign teachers and scholars.
