The White House fired all 24 members of the National Science Board on April 24, leaving the NSF without governance just days before its scheduled May 5 meeting. I need you to demand the immediate restoration of the board and protection of the institutional independence that has made American science the world's leader.
The National Science Board was created in 1950 specifically to insulate $9 billion in annual federal research funding from political cycles. Members serve staggered six-year terms and must be chosen "solely on the basis of established records of distinguished service" in science, engineering, and education. This structure exists because postwar leaders understood that scientific progress operates on a longer timeline than election cycles. Vannevar Bush's vision in "Science, the Endless Frontier" was clear: federal science requires governance protected from political pressure.
Firing the entire board doesn't reform the NSF. It dismantles the institutional architecture that produced American scientific preeminence. When research priorities shift with each administration instead of following the arc of scientific progress, we lose the stability that attracts top researchers and enables long-term breakthroughs. The May 5 meeting has no agenda and no board. That absence threatens decades of carefully built scientific infrastructure. Speak out now.
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