Todd Wolfson of Rutgers University talks about the deep funding cuts the Trump administration is making to universities and tells Wolf Blitzer how he thinks schools should fight back.

Washington

Rutgers University Professor Todd Wolfson has spoken about the funding cuts to universities in the United States made by the Trump administration, highlighting concerns from faculty and researchers across the country. According to Wolfson, major reductions in support from bodies such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) are affecting institutions ranging from Ivy League universities to public and community colleges.

Wolfson noted that faculty at several universities are advocating for a unified legal response to these cuts, with some Big Ten schools considering a mutual legal defense pact. He emphasized that while some schools, particularly Ivy League institutions, have been primarily targeted, public universities including Rutgers, University of Michigan, and University of Virginia are also experiencing significant funding reductions.

The potential impact of these cuts is highlighted by concerns from Harvard University researchers about losing decades of scientific data. Wolfson argued that decreased funding threatens ongoing research on critical health issues such as cancer, Alzheimer's, diabetes, and heart disease. He stated that Johns Hopkins University, a major recipient of NIH funding, and the State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo could also be affected by these reductions.

Wolfson acknowledged that not all faculty agree on how to respond, referencing differing opinions on the mutual legal defense pact. However, he stated that faculty, students, and staff have been leading efforts to organize a collective response and encourage university administrators to take action.



University Prof.: Trump trying to ‘bully’ schools with funding cuts

Nearly two dozen states will be in a Boston courtroom to challenge President Trump's slash funding of health and medical research by the National Institutes of Health. It comes as U.S. colleges and universities around the country are reeling from their own funding cuts over on-campus culture. One leading nutrition researcher at Harvard University tells CNN that a treasure trove of data collected over 45 years could be lost and years of scientific research could come to a sudden end. The consequences would be enormous. Now some faculty members at some Big Ten schools are urging administrators to band together with a mutual legal defense pact as they brace for potential court fights. Let's discuss this with Rutgers University Professor Todd Wolfson. He's helping to lead the effort over at Rutgers University. Thanks so much, Professor, for joining us. Why do you want a unified approach as opposed to each school challenging the Trump attacks on its own? I mean, we want a unified attack because what Trump is trying to do is take one university at a time and bully that university through a host of different measures. And so our feeling is that if the universities come together and defend all of higher ed together, we need to defend the entirety of the sector. And so if the university system comes together and stands up together, whether it's the Big Ten, whether it's a larger group of universities, we're going to have more power to respond to the Trump administration with their really outrageous attacks on our system. So far, the Trump administration has mostly, mostly targeted some Ivy League schools, especially Harvard University. Do you think public state universities like Rutgers, where you teach, are the next target? They already are targets. From the attacks on DEI in higher ed to the attacks on NIH and NSF funding to the attacks on our students and their visas. That's not just happening at Harvard or Columbia. That's happening at Rutgers University, University of Michigan, University of Virginia. And so the attacks are coming down on the entire system. What the Trump administration is trying to do is say that higher ed is exemplified by Harvard. It's not. It's exemplified by community colleges, small four-year colleges, and public universities like Rutgers, which are also under attack. So yeah, the attacks are coming. I mean, Rutgers is seeing millions of dollars of research funding cut from the NIH, from NSF, et cetera. Ultimately, as you know, professor, school administrators, not professors, will make the final decision. Why are university administrators, at least many of them so far, reluctant to take on the Trump administration? You know, I think, and this is where I want to start by saying that faculty, students, and staff have been leading in the fight back against the Trump administration's outrageous attacks on higher education, whether it's the millions or billions of dollars in cuts to the NIH and NSF, or the attacks on our institutions like Harvard, Columbia, and Princeton, or the abduction of our students off the street. And finally, our universities are standing up with faculty, students, and staff. And so I think that if faculty continue to stand up with our students and with the other workers on our campuses, we will force our universities to stand up with us. So the Mutual Defense Pact is another example of faculty leading and moving the universities into a position where they join us. And I'll say one more thing here, which is we cannot fight one school at a time. And that's one of the reasons why our administrators of our schools are so slow to respond, because what they're thinking about is their own school's interests. They don't want to put their neck too far out, because then the Trump administration, which has shown itself to be bullies, attacks that specific institution. But if we don't recognize that this is a fight over the future of higher education, and as higher education goes, so goes democracy, we won't be able to fight for all of us. And so that's why we need a collective response to the Trump administration. As you know, Professor, not necessarily all faculty are on board with this idea. One professor at the University of Michigan is calling it, and I'm quoting now, a legal mutual suicide pact. How do you respond to that? I mean, that's funny. I hadn't heard that. I would say that the University of Michigan's vote around the Mutual Defense Pact, it's one of the only ones where the entirety of the faculty voted. And it was something like a 90 percent vote for the Mutual Defense Pact. Anything you do is not going to have a unanimity among 100 percent. So I think a 90 percent Democratic test is pretty good. And very quickly, before I let you go, Professor, how worried should my alma maters be, the State University of New York at Buffalo and the Johns Hopkins University? Say again, what about them? How worried should they be about financial damage as a result of what the Trump administration is doing, the State University of New York at Buffalo and the Johns Hopkins University? Well, Johns Hopkins University gets a lot of NIH funding. And so they should be very worried, right? Last year at this time, the NIH had given out over $7 billion in funding. This year, they've given out about $3 billion. If we extrapolate that out across the rest of the year, that's a $20 billion cut to our biomedical research infrastructure. And that cut means no research on cancer, on Alzheimer's, on diabetes, on heart disease, which is going to have a drastic impact on every American. So I think Johns Hopkins should be very concerned and they need to stand up with us, SUNY Buffalo as well. And SUNY also passed a Mutual Defense Pact, the entirety of the SUNY system. And so it's time for us all to get together, stand up against these outrageous attacks on higher education and tell Trump enough is enough. Yep. Good point. Professor Todd Wolfson of Rutgers University in New Jersey, thanks very much for joining us. Thanks for having me.

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