N.J. sues NIH over new cap to indirect research funding

New Jersey is joining 21 other states to sue the Trump administration after federal officials announced cuts to indirect funding for medical and public health research.

The National Institutes of Health announced Friday the agency would implement a 15% cap on indirect funding. While federal grants are given to scientists to execute research, indirect funding is given to the universities or institutions that host a scientist’s work, per NBC. Such indirect funding helps cover overhead costs like equipment, operations, maintenance, and personnel.

The Trump administration, which has been scouring federal agencies for spending cuts since last month’s inauguration, said the average indirect funds rate for NIH grants sat at about 27% or 28%. An NIH office announced the cap moving forward would be set to 15%, a limit higher education leaders said could limit research. 

The coalition is asking a federal judge to keep the cap from going into effect, though the NIH said the new policy would be implemented Monday. The states argue the new policy illegally pulls the rug out from institutions that negotiated for specific rates and puts potentially life-saving research at risk of cancellation.

“The Trump Administration’s attack on public health research funding is a direct attack on our State, which has long led the nation in medical and health innovations that have saved countless lives across our country,” Attorney General Matt Platkin said in a release. “Our universities, labs, and research institutions have fought COVID-19, cancer, and many more issues of public interest, but now they have to fight the cruelty and shortsightedness of President Trump and his political appointees.”

The states argue the indirect funding cap violates a statute passed during Trump’s first term that prohibits the NIH from “requiring categorial and indiscriminate changes” to indirect funding.

The states filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts.

The cap on indirect funding is separate from another controversial order that would have frozen trillions in federal spending. A federal judge has blocked that order. Platkin joined a suit against that order as well. 

Platkin sued the Trump administration over an executive order that would have limited birthright citizenship. Platkin called that executive order a “clearly unconstitutional” interpretation of the 14th Amendment. Federal judges have temporarily blocked Trump’s birthright citizenship order from taking effect.

“The lesson here for this administration is we are prepared,” Platkin said last month. “We are prepared to stand up for the rule of law. We are prepared to stand up for the residents of our state and of this nation when he unconstitutionally and unlawfully targets them in ways that hurt them in very real ways.”