Inside (the Beltway) Scoop

By: Ellen Kuo
Wednesday, April 10, 2024
President Releases FY 2025 Budget

On March 11, 2024, President Biden released his budget for FY 2025 for Congress’ consideration. In the budget, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) would receive a program level of $50.1 billion, which does not include a separate funding amount of $1.5 billion for the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health or ARPA-H, thereby reaching a total program level of $51.6 billion to support NIH’s mission to turn biomedical research discoveries into better health for all.

The overall request includes discretionary budget authority of $46.4 and another $83 million is for Superfund research activities. Nearly $2.02 billion of the NIH total request is derived from Program Evaluation financing, with another $1.71 billion identified as mandatory resources for special type 1 Diabetes ($260 million) and Cancer Moonshot ($1.45 billion) research. NIH has the goal to link laboratories to clinics and communities, and to make sure that the information it collects is used safely and ethically to improve health.

The Ad Hoc Group for Medical Research and FASEB support a FY 2025 recommendation of $51.3 billion, endorsed by more than 372 groups representing patients, scientists, health professionals, research and academic institutions, educators, and industry.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has a targeted request of $10.183 billion which is far short of the FY 2025 authorization level under the CHIPS and Science Act, 2022 for the NSF which is $16.7 billion. This law aimed to double NSF’s budget over a five-year period with suggested authorization levels.

NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan said in response to this budget that, “For almost 75 years, NSF has advanced the frontiers of the full spectrum of science and engineering research and innovation. The fiscal year 2025 budget will build on prior investments and enable NSF to continue to invest in advancing fundamental discoveries and emerging technologies, promoting access to STEM instruction and workforce training in every corner of our country, pioneering climate research and development, unleashing regional innovation across the nation, and bolstering research infrastructure. NSF will continue to deliver on priorities articulated in the CHIPS and Science Act, such as developing the labor and technical skills needed to meet national industry requirements and expand efforts in research security that are vital to U.S. interests worldwide.”

Meanwhile, the Department of Energy Office of Science is budgeted at $8.583 billion, but this is $1 billion below the Energy Sciences Coalition request of $9.5 billion for the Office of Science for FY 2025. The budget calls for the Agriculture Food and Research Initiative (AFRI) to receive $475 million, which would be a $30 million boost from FY 2023 and below the $700 million authorization level for AFRI. The Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical and Prosthetic Research Program would receive $868 million under the proposed budget. Both of these recommendations do not correspond to the higher requests of the AFRI coalition ($500 million) or the Friends of VA Medical Care and Health Research (friendsofva.org) of $1.05 billion for medical and prosthetic research.

Congress has already begun hearings with agency officials to review the budget. Additional hearings are expected to take place throughout April and May in advance of House and Senate Appropriations Committee consideration of the FY 2025 spending bills that will determine funding levels for each agency and program