Inside (the Beltway) Scoop

By: Ellen Kuo
Thursday, December 18, 2025
FASEB’s Day of Action to Protect Lifesaving Medical Research

FASEB’s 110,000 biomedical researchers joined United for Cures’ patient advocacy campaign on December 3 to make phone calls and send emails to Congress asking for funding for life-changing and lifesaving medical research. In their messages, advocates recommended that Congress adopt the Senate Appropriations committee’s funding level for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) of $47.2 billion for fiscal year (FY) 2026, which is higher than the House’s mark. Congress has not finalized the FY 2026 bill funding the agency and is facing a deadline of January 30, the date the current “continuing resolution” (CR) expires. Advocates were able to personalize their messages to add in diseases of concern that had no cures or limited treatment, and/or describe their medical research funded by NIH and the value of that work to advancing our nation’s health span.

In FY 2026, the President’s budget proposed to cut funding for medical research at the NIH by 40 percent. Cutting federal medical research funding would have devastating consequences. These cuts would stall progress, end clinical trials prematurely, and close the door to potential life-changing or even lifesaving treatments.

Nearly 400 messages were sent from FASEB supporting NIH’s work. The alert will continue to December 20, so there is still time to join the campaign and share the link on social media. Please visit UnitedforCures for more coverage and to see videos from advocates.

Congress is likely to break for the holidays without taking any further action on the nine remaining unfinished FY 2026 appropriations bills. However, the leaders of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees have publicly stated a desire to resume negotiations on those bills as soon as they return from the holiday break in early January, especially since there is concern that any spending decisions not finalized by the end of January will leave federal agencies with a year-long CR that freezes funding at the FY 2025 level (which was frozen from FY 2024). It will take bipartisan agreements among the House and Senate to complete work on the appropriations bills in January, so this is a critical time for elected officials to hear from the research community!