The White House’s Plan to Dismantle NOAA’s Research Program

Internal documents obtained by the New York Times and several people with knowledge of the situation show Trump administration officials recommend elimination of the scientific research department in the National Maritime and Atmospheric Administration.

The proposal from the Office of Management and Budget would abolish NOAA’s Marine and Atmospheric Research Institute, one of the world’s premiere geoscience research centres.

The budget allocations of more than $170 million to about $485 million in 2024 have increased nearly four times faster than the rest of the planet over the past 40 years, as science is as diverse as the early warning systems for natural disasters, science education for kindergarten students, science education in high schools, and research in the Arctic.

“At this funding level, OARs will be eliminated as line offices,” the proposal states.

The funded program, which includes tornado warnings and marine acidification research, will be relocated to the National Weather Service and the National Marine Services Office.

An overview of the 2026 budget passback that needs to be approved by Congress suggests “significant reductions in education, grants, research and climate-related programs within NOAA,” following the removal of the demolition of other institutions, such as the Institute of International Health and the US Agency for International Development, and the removal of climate change from federal government websites.

Under the proposal, the Department of Commerce’s total budget will be nearly $7.7 billion, down more than $2.5 billion from the 2025 level. The budget will focus on activities that are in line with the Trump administration’s agenda, including implementing trade laws and collecting scientific observations such as ocean and weather data to support forecasts.

“This administration’s hostility to climate science research and rejection will result in contenting the weather forecasting capabilities that the plan claims to preserve,” Zoe Lofgren, a senior Democrat with the House Science Committee, said in an emailed statement.

NOAA, which accounts for more than half of the Department of Commerce budget, will receive a small $4.4 billion cut from 2025, cutting $1.6 billion.

“It’s not surprising, but it’s very disturbing,” said Rick Spinrad, who led NOAA under President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

This includes reducing the National Marine Fisheries Services budget by a third. The office will be split from NOAA and will be moved to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service of the Department of the Interior. Funding for species recovery and habitat conservation is eliminated.

Funds for NOAA’s branch of National Ocean Service will be cut in half. Programs like the Coastal Marine Science Center, offices within marine services that study the effects of climate change and sea level rise on coral, pollution, and coastal communities will not be funded.

Environmental Information Centres, which archive climate data, will lose a quarter of their funds.

The proposal also changes NOAA’s satellite and space programs.

It will destroy the Department of Space and Commerce office and relocate the Space Weather Prediction Center to the Department of Homeland Security. A program called the Space Traffic Coordination System, set up to take over satellite traffic surveillance from the Department of Defense, a type of traffic police for space, will also lose funds. Passback suggests that such work will be carried out by the private sector.

The satellite programme that provides weather and modeling data will also be reduced. The long-standing relationship that will help NOAA acquire satellites through NASA will also end.

Dr. Spinlad said the budget proposed by the White House is unlikely to pass Congress. “I don’t think I’ll endure the scrutiny of Congress.”

According to the document, passbacks are part of balancing federal budgets, including “eliminating support for the federal awakening ideology.”

Project 2025 is a document that has been used as a blueprint for federal overhauls under the Trump administration, and included the goal of disbanding NOAA and reducing its research division.

“That raises doubts. Is the Trump administration intentionally breaking our weather capabilities as an excuse to implement the dangerous project 2025 proposal to privatize weather services?” Lofglen said in a statement.

Published by the conservative policy research institute, The Heritage Foundation, Project 2025, called NOAA research “many sources of NOAA climate warnings,” and said “the dominance of climate change research needs to be dissolved.”

“This will bring the United States back to the 1950s with technical and scientific skills,” said Craig McLean, NOAA’s chief scientist under both the first President Trump and Biden in the budget proposal.

Agents must appeal the proposal until noon on April 15th. And until April 24th, many plans for the overhaul suggested by Passback will need to be submitted, even before the proposal is addressed by Congress.

On Thursday, probation officials who were fired in February and later resurrected by judges received an email from the Department of Commerce, who fired them again after the decision was overturned by a superior court. The so-called Force Plan cuts could further reduce 20% of the workforce in the coming weeks.