What’s Ahead

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin are key players in budget negotiations that will have major implications for science funding. (Image credit – Office of Speaker Pelosi / Julio Obscura; The White House / Andrea Hanks)

Budget Cap Negotiations Intensify with August Recess Approaching

Congressional leaders are pushing this week to strike an agreement with the White House that would raise caps on federal spending and the nation’s debt limit. Pressure to reach a deal is increasing because the House is scheduled to adjourn for its traditional August recess next week, and the Treasury Department has warned it could run out of funds in September if the debt limit is not increased. Furthermore, across-the-board cuts to discretionary programs could be triggered if the budget caps are not raised by the end of the current fiscal year on Oct. 1. According to a report by the Washington Post, the deal is expected to set spending levels for fiscal years 2020 and 2021, though it remains uncertain whether President Trump will disregard calls to offset the increases with spending cuts.

Top OSTP Officials Testifying Before Congress

White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Kelvin Droegemeier is appearing before a House appropriations subcommittee on Wednesday for a general budget and oversight hearing. It is the first time he has testified on Capitol Hill since his nomination hearing almost one year ago. Concurrently, Michael Kratsios is appearing alongside five other witnesses at a Senate hearing that will review his nomination to be OSTP’s associate director for technology. Kratsios has been serving as deputy assistant to the president for technology policy since the beginning of the Trump administration. He was also the top political appointee at OSTP until Droegemeier was sworn in earlier this year. Droegemeier has said he does not anticipate any other associate directors will be nominated before the 2020 presidential election.

Houston Hearing to Examine Hurricane Resiliency

The House Science Committee is holding a field hearing Monday in Environment Subcommittee Chair Lizzie Fletcher’s (D-TX) Houston-area district on using research to improve hurricane resiliency. Fletcher has often discussed the impact that flooding from Hurricane Harvey had on her region in 2017. The witnesses include Louis Uccellini, director of the National Weather Service; Jim Blackburn, co-director of the Severe Storm Prediction, Education, and Evacuation from Disasters (SSPEED) Center at Rice University; Hanadi Rifai, director of the Hurricane Resilience Research Institute at the University of Houston; and Emily Grover-Kopec, director of insurance practice at One Concern, a company that uses machine learning to predict and quantify the impacts of natural disasters.

Science Committee Looks to Catalyze Sustainable Chemistry

The House Science Committee’s Research and Technology Subcommittee is holding a hearing Thursday on ways of improving the environmental sustainability of chemistry research and chemical production. Three scientists will appear as witnesses, representing industry, academia, and the Government Accountability Office, which released a 160-page report in 2018 assessing the landscape of sustainable chemistry methods. Several committee members are sponsors of the bipartisan Sustainable Chemistry Research and Development Act, which would establish an interagency group to coordinate relevant research and training programs.

Senate Panel Continues Tour of Energy Innovation Landscape

At a hearing on Thursday, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will continue its recent work on energy innovation by looking at its implications for economic growth and national competitiveness. The hearing comes on the heels of the committee’s approval last week of 22 energy policy bills, including amended versions of the Nuclear Energy Leadership Act, Enhancing Fossil Fuel Energy Carbon Technology (EFFECT) Act, and Launching Energy Advancement and Development through Innovations for Natural Gas (LEADING) Act. House Science Committee Ranking Member Frank Lucas (R-OK) introduced a House companion to the LEADING Act on July 18.

DOE National Lab Leaders Head to the Hill

The Department of Energy is holding its annual National Lab Day on the Hill this Wednesday. This year’s theme is electric grid modernization, and the event will feature a “fireside chat” with DOE Under Secretary for Science Paul Dabbar and three of the department’s former under secretaries: Lynn Orr, Steve Koonin, and Kristina Johnson. The remarks will be followed by a reception sponsored by several science organizations, including AIP.

Set of Science Policy Bills En Route to Senate

The House is scheduled to vote on a number of uncontroversial science policy bills this week:

The Combating Sexual Harassment in Science Act would require federal science funding agencies to implement common policies for handling sexual harassment, including directing grant recipient institutions to report harassment findings and major administrative actions taken in response to allegations. It would also direct National Science Foundation to support research related to sexual harassment in science.
The Energy and Water Research Integration Act would direct the Department of Energy to incorporate considerations of water use efficiency and variability, among other factors, into its R&D programs.
The Building Blocks of STEM Act would encourage NSF to increase research on STEM education in early childhood.
The American Manufacturing Leadership Act would update policies governing Manufacturing USA, a network of advanced manufacturing institutes.
The Vera C. Rubin Survey Telescope Designation Act would rename the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope after Rubin, who pioneered work on dark matter.
The DOE and Veterans’ Health Initiative Act would direct DOE to carry out a research initiative focused on the application of supercomputing and artificial intelligence to health data collected by the Department of Veterans Affairs and other sources.

Lunar Science Plans Center Stage at NASA Forum

The sixth NASA Exploration Science Forum is convening Tuesday and Wednesday at the agency’s Ames Research Center in California. A major focus of the event will be the plans for lunar science that are developing in conjunction with the Artemis program to return astronauts to the lunar surface. NASA currently anticipates sending the first of what it expects will be an ongoing series of commercially operated robotic missions to the Moon in September 2020. Two presentations on the program will be dedicated to the scientific legacy of the Apollo 11 mission 50 years ago.

In Case You Missed It

OSTP Director Kelvin Droegemeier addressing the National Science Board on July 18. At left is Maria Zuber, a board member and vice president for research at MIT. (Image credit – NSB)

Droegemeier Details Research Security Initiatives

At a meeting of the National Science Board last week, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Kelvin Droegemeier discussed current interagency efforts to improve research security. Through the recently formed Joint Committee on Research Environments, he said, agencies are focusing particularly on communicating more examples of threats, identifying best practices for security policies, harmonizing requirements around disclosure of foreign sources of research support, and developing risk assessment methods to balance security considerations with the benefits of openness in science. Stressing that the government does not want to stigmatize foreign students, Droegemeier said he has been mulling options for a “big full-on activity where we get many more Americans in STEM but we also, at the same time, provide an environment that increases the capability for others from foreign nations to come here and study here and stay here provided that they share our values.”

Harvard President Criticizes Visa Uncertainties

Last week, Harvard University President Lawrence Bacow wrote to the Departments of State and Homeland Security complaining that delays and uncertainties surrounding visa processing have negatively impacted students and researchers. He pointed specifically to “postponements and disruptions” for previously routine matters such as obtaining family visas, status renewals, and clearance for international travel, as well as to the heightened scrutiny of individuals from a “few specific countries.” He also pointed to uncertainty surrounding policy concerning Dreamers, who were brought to the United States without documentation as children and have previously benefited from having protected status.

New Research Security Bills Look to Boost Info Sharing, Cyberdefense

On July 16, Sens. John Cornyn (R-TX) and Jacky Rosen (D-NV) introduced the Secure American Research Act, a bill that is similar to legislation advancing in the House that would create forums for coordinating research security policies across federal agencies and increase dialogue between scientific and security communities. However, it also contains further provisions directing agencies to share non-public data among themselves concerning “completed investigations of researchers that were determined to be knowingly fraudulent in disclosure of foreign interests, investments, or involvement.” Another provision would require research grantees to adhere to cybersecurity standards that will be based on guidelines set by an interagency working group. A separate House bill introduced by Rep. Brian Babin (R-TX) this month also aims to protect research data from cyber theft, directing the Department of Defense to create a “computing enclave pilot program” in partnership with three higher education institutions.

House Passes Intelligence Policy Bill

The House passed a major authorization act for intelligence agencies last week on a vote of 397 to 31. The bill and its accompanying report contain a number of science-related provisions, such as pay increases for STEM positions, the creation of an advisory council on the security impacts of climate change, and several reporting requirements related to securing U.S. research and technology from foreign governments. During floor debate on the bill, the House adopted an amendment requiring the Director of National Intelligence to report on how current efforts to counter espionage backed by the Chinese government impacts the privacy and civil liberties of Chinese Americans. The Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus advocated for the amendment, citing two recent high-profile cases in which Chinese American researchers were wrongfully accused of espionage. The White House has expressed “significant concern” with several provisions in the bill, including its proposal to establish an Energy Infrastructure Security Center at the Department of Energy, which the administration argues would be duplicative with existing efforts.

Democrats Make Case for Scientific Integrity Act

Democratic members of the House Science Committee used a July 17 hearing on scientific integrity to press their case for codifying minimum standards for federal agencies’ integrity policies through the Scientific Integrity Act. Reintroduced in March, the bill currently has 199 cosponsors in the House, none of whom is a Republican. Rep. Paul Tonko (D-NY), the lead sponsor of the House version of the bill, noted that its development was motivated by unevenness in the enforcement and scope of existing policies and that such measures would be needed under any administration. However, he added, “the abuses directed by this president and his top officials have brought a new urgency to the issue.” Though witnesses and committee members from both parties agreed science should be free from political interference, Investigations and Oversight Subcommittee Ranking Member Ralph Norman (R-SC) suggested the hearing was an example of how Democrats are “politicizing” scientific integrity as an issue.

GAO Charts Sharp Shifts in EPA Advisory Committees

The Government Accountability Office released a report on July 15 that details a reduction over the past two years in the representation of academics on the Environmental Protection Agency’s Science Advisory Board and Board of Scientific Counselors. GAO also found that the geographic distribution of members changed significantly on the SAB and that EPA failed to follow its procedures for vetting nominees for the board and other advisory committees. In a House Science Committee hearing held a day after the report release, former EPA advisors linked the findings to prior actions taken by Trump officials to dismiss a significant portion of the members serving on certain committees and forbid scientists funded by active EPA grants from serving on the panels. Democratic committee leadership warned such actions paired with a recent presidential order directing agencies to reduce the number of advisory committees diminish the federal government’s access to top talent. Republican leaders expressed support for the order as a mechanism to better align committees with present agency missions and argued that the hearing’s singular focus on EPA prevented members from gaining a better understanding of how the order might impact other agencies.

APS and AAAS Warn DOE Against Shuttering Advisory Panels

On July 15, the American Physical Society and American Association for the Advancement of Science sent a letter to the Department of Energy concerning President Trump’s recent order directing federal agencies to discontinue a significant fraction of their advisory committees. (APS is an AIP Member Society.) The letter conveys “serious concerns” over the order’s implications for the six committees that advise the DOE Office of Science, the largest funder of fundamental physical science research in the U.S. It asserts that without the committees’ input at crucial junctures, “the course of scientific user facilities would have been very different, almost certainly leaving the U.S. in a position of weakness vis-à-vis international competition.” House Science Committee Chair Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) has also expressed dismay over the order and wrote to the heads of DOE and other agencies on July 12 requesting information about their plans for implementing it and the expected impact on their ability to obtain expert advice.

AAAS CEO Rush Holt Steps Down

The American Association for the Advancement of Science announced on July 15 that its CEO Rush Holt has stepped aside, with former CEO Alan Leshner filling in until a permanent replacement is hired. During Holt’s four and a half years at AAAS, the organization has cast itself and its more than 120,000 members as a “force for science,” advocating with policymakers and the public on behalf of the scientific community. It also recently established a Center for Scientific Evidence in Public Issues, which aims to facilitate policymakers’ and other decision-makers’ access to scientific expertise. Before AAAS, Holt served as assistant director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory and then eight terms as a Democratic congressman. He first announced his decision to retire in February.

Events This Week

Monday, July 22

National Academies: “Catalyzing Opportunities for Research in the Earth Sciences” meeting five (continues through Wednesday) Keck Center (500 5th St. NW, DC) National Academies: “Deployment and Scale Up of Technologies for Deep Decarbonization: A Workshop” (continues through Wednesday) National Academy of Sciences building (2101 Constitution Ave. NW, DC) National Academies: Webinar on Scenarios for Climate Intervention Strategies that Reflect Sunlight to Cool Earth 12:00 - 2:00 pm House: “Weathering the Storm: Improving Hurricane Resiliency Through Research” 3:00 pm CDT, Science Committee field hearing (Houston Community College, TX)

Tuesday, July 23

NASA: Exploration Science Forum (continues through Thursday) Moffett Field, CA National Academies: “Review of Progress Toward Implementing the Decadal Survey - Solar and Space Physics,” meeting three (continues through Thursday) Woods Hole, MA House: “Protecting Every Citizen: Assessing Emergency Preparedness for Underserved Populations” 10:00 am, Homeland Security Committee field hearing (Jersey City, NJ) Senate: “Oversight of the FBI” 10:00 am, Judiciary Committee (226 Dirksen Office Building) Wilson Center: “America’s Highly Skilled Workforce, the Talent Pipeline, and H-1B Visas” 10:00 am - 12:00 pm, Woodrow Wilson Center (1300 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, DC) Webcast available National Humanities Alliance: Congressional Exhibition on the History of American Enterprise and Innovation 4:00 - 5:00 pm, 485 Russell Senate Office Building

Wednesday, July 24

NASA: Aeronautics Advisory Committee meeting (continues Thursday) NASA Glenn Research Center (Cleveland, OH) Webcast available National Academies: “The Role of NIH in Drug Development Innovation and its Impact on Patient Access: A Workshop” (continues Thursday) Keck Center (500 5th St. NW, DC) Senate: Nomination hearing for William Bryan to be DHS undersecretary for science and technology 9:30 am, Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee (342 Dirksen Office Building) House: “Building America’s Clean Future: Pathways to Decarbonize the Economy” 10:00 am, Energy and Commerce Committee (2123 Rayburn Office Building) House: “The Costs of Climate Change: From Coasts to Heartland, Health to Security” 10:00 am, Budget Committee (210 Cannon Office Building) House: Markup of solar, wind, and fossil energy R&D bills 10:00 am, Science Committee (2318 Rayburn Office Building) House: Budget and oversight hearing for OSTP 10:15 am, Appropriations Committee (2358-A Rayburn Office Building) Senate: Nomination hearing for Michael Kratsios to be OSTP associate director 10:30 am, Commerce Committee (216 Hart Office Building) DOE/National Lab Caucus: National Lab Day on the Hill 4:00 - 7:00 pm, 2318 and 2168 Rayburn Office Building

Thursday, July 25

Commerce Department: Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Advisory Committee meeting 9:00 am - 5:00 pm, Herbert Hoover Building (1401 Constitution Ave. NW, DC) Senate: Full committee hearing on energy innovation 10:00 am, Energy and Natural Resources Committee (366 Dirksen Office Building) House: “Benign by Design: Innovations in Sustainable Chemistry” 10:00 am, Science Committee (2318 Rayburn Office Building) CSIS: “Training the Next Revolution in American Manufacturing” 10:00 - 11:30 am, CSIS headquarters (1616 Rhode Island Ave. NW, DC) Webcast available Senate: “The Right Thing To Do: Conservatives for Climate Action” 11:30 am, Climate Crisis Special Committee (212 Senate Visitors Center) Carbon Capture Coalition: “The Environmental and Economic Benefits of Carbon Capture” 11:45 am - 1:00 pm, 212-10 Senate Visitors Center House: “The Commercial Space Landscape: Innovation, Market, and Policy” 2:00 pm, Science Committee (2318 Rayburn Office Building) House: “When Science Gets Trumped: Scientific Integrity at the Department of the Interior” 2:00 pm, Natural Resources Committee (1324 Longworth Office Building) House: “Russia and Arms Control: Extending New START or Starting Over?” 2:00 pm, Foreign Affairs Committee (2172 Rayburn Office Building)

Friday, July 26

NASA: Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group meeting California Institute of Technology (Pasadena, CA) Webcast available

Monday, July 29

DOD: Defense Science Board meeting (continues through Friday) National Academies Beckman Center (Irvine, CA)

Opportunities

DOE Seeking Input on Microelectronics Initiative

The Department of Energy Office of Science is considering launching a basic research initiative for microelectronics and invites input on the topical areas, innovation mechanisms, and collaborations that could be pursued through the effort. DOE is particularly interested in feedback on how its unique facilities and capabilities could be leveraged in the initiative. Comments are due Aug. 30.

Draft NOAA R&D Plan Open for Comment

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is seeking input on the agency’s R&D plan covering 2020 to 2026. The strategic plan aims to create a common understanding among NOAA’s workforce, partners, and constituents on the value and direction of the agency’s R&D activities and is set for release this year. Comments are due Aug. 26.

APLU Hiring Assistant Director for Research Policy

The Association of Public and Land-grant Universities is seeking an assistant director for research policy. The assistant director will focus on communicating the impact of university research, reducing regulatory compliance burdens, and “ensuring the resilience and security of the research enterprise,” among other duties. Preference will be given to applicants with a doctoral degree and at least three years of relevant work experience. Applications will be reviewed on an ongoing basis until the position is filled.

For additional opportunities, please visit www.aip.org/fyi/opportunities. Know of an opportunity for scientists to engage in science policy? Email us at fyi@aip.org.Know of an upcoming science policy event either inside or outside the Beltway? Email us at fyi@aip.org.