Episode August 18, 2025 21 min 48s

What It’s Like To Have Trump Hold Your Science Research Hostage

The Trump administration’s crackdown on universities across the country for alleged antisemitism has made its way from the East Coast to the West Coast. Earlier this month, the administration demanded the University of California Los Angeles pay $1-billion to the federal government to resolve what it’s calling civil rights violations. That was on top of more than half a billion dollars in cuts to federal research funding from the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and other federal sources. But, a federal judge on Friday said the cuts to UCLA’s funding violated a previous order and ruled some of the funding must be restored. To talk more about the impact the funding cuts have had, we spoke with Dr. Aradhna Tripati, a professor of climate science and geochemistry at UCLA. Joining her in the conversation is Monique Trinh, a program Manager in Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine.

And in the headlines: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is set to meet with President Donald Trump at the White House, Secretary of State Marco Rubio defends the department's decision to halt visitor visas for people from Gaza, and more National Guard troops are headed to DC at the behest of Trump.

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