The White House plans to accelerate federal research reform, redirecting more
R&D funding toward AI applications and individual investigators rather than
primarily to universities, according to a draft report and memos seen by the
Wall Street Journal. The Office of Science and Technology Policy is expected to
release guidance on Tuesday that would influence roughly $200 billion of annual
federal R&D spending and steer allocations through the remainder of the Trump
administration. The administration says it will prioritize funding mechanisms
aimed at individual researchers—scholarships, prize programs and investigators
awards—over direct university block grants; cited demonstration programs include
NSF graduate-level initiatives and NIH awards for innovative scientists.
