tl;dr: The Trump administration's cuts via DOGE have gutted U.S. science funding: ~95,000 federal scientists have left, NIH and NSF are issuing far fewer grants, and projects like the AXIS space telescope died from staff losses and budget chaos rather than outright cancellation. Politically-driven filters now block research touching on DEI, structural racism, or foreign collaborations, breaking the post-WWII compact between government and academia and pushing researchers to consider leaving the country. Critics argue the shift reflects a Silicon Valley-influenced view that science should primarily generate commercial returns, which historical analysis suggests would have prevented roughly half of today's drugs from existing.