Nine universities and three higher-education organizations sued the Department of Energy on Monday, arguing that proposed funding cuts would “devastate” research and violate existing federal regulations.
DOE’s move Friday to cap “indirect” costs to college and university awards at 15 percent run counter to Office of Management and Budget rules, the universities said in a complaint, which was backed by the Association of American Universities, American Council on Education, and Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities. The plan would halt research on industries such as advanced nuclear, cybersecurity and the electric grid, they argued.
Many “critical projects — often the product of years or decades of effort — are in jeopardy of being stopped in their tracks,” the plaintiffs said in the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, adding that “the human cost will be immense, as universities will have to immediately reduce staff and training programs — irreversibly damaging their academic communities, the careers of these young researchers, and the national interest in training the next generation of scientists.”
Brown University, the California Institute of Technology, Cornell University, the board of trustees at the University of Illinois, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Michigan, the board of trustees at Michigan State University, the trustees of Princeton University, and the University of Rochester in New York joined the complaint.
