During Wednesday’s Senate Appropriations Committee hearing, Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) slammed proposed cuts to the National Institutes of Health.
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00:00I'm now happy to turn to Vice Chair Murray for her opening statement.
00:06Thank you very much.
00:08And let me start by congratulating you, Senator Collins, first hearing as chair.
00:13We've managed to do a lot of bipartisan work over the past few years,
00:16and I hope we can continue to build off of that record.
00:19And I really appreciate this important hearing on biomedical research.
00:24It is an issue with longstanding bipartisan support.
00:28We have worked together for many times over the years, along with our colleagues,
00:33to invest in advancing medical breakthroughs.
00:36And those investments have paid off in so many ways,
00:39not just billions in economic activity, hundreds of thousands of jobs,
00:44and a medical research enterprise that is the envy of the world.
00:48They've also paid off with genuine miracles, cures that were once impossible,
00:53treatments that were once unthinkable.
00:56These are investments that give patients hope for the future,
01:00that give them back a life derailed by a disease,
01:03that give people precious more time with their loved ones,
01:07which is why I am so deeply alarmed that President Trump has taken a wrecking ball
01:12to our biomedical research enterprise.
01:15He and Elon Musk have been tossing tomorrow's groundbreaking cures into a shredder.
01:20From day one, Doge has been cutting critical research without rhyme or reason or any regard for who gets hurt.
01:28Trump has already axed 800 grants over a billion dollars in research for HIV prevention,
01:35breast cancer, pregnancy, diabetes, Alzheimer's, and more.
01:40They've also blocked two billion dollars in grant funding from going out to universities and research institutions across our country.
01:49And they slapped a one dollar limit on NIH researchers' payment cards,
01:54meaning that our labs cannot get gloves or pipettes and vials.
01:59These are the basic things you need to do to do research.
02:01If Trump and Musk have their way, they are not just going to grind medical research to a halt,
02:07they will send it careening backwards.
02:09Because Trump apparently wants to slash 21 billion dollars from NIH next year.
02:16That would be a 44% cut, the biggest cut in NIH history.
02:21He also wants to defy a bipartisan law, this committee worked to pass,
02:26so he can massively cut funding for basic costs that keeps our labs running.
02:33If Trump succeeds here, a lot of world-class research institutions,
02:37like the Fred Hutch Cancer Center and the University of Washington in my state,
02:42will face massive shortfalls.
02:44The fact that Trump and Musk are pushing such a painful policy
02:48really underscores how they don't know or don't care whether their policies actually hurt people.
02:55And if you needed any more evidence that there's no real strategy here,
03:00just consider the Women's Health Initiative.
03:03It was coordinated by the Fred Hutch Cancer Center in my home state of Washington.
03:08It has led to major advancements in our understanding of women's health issues,
03:14especially in older women.
03:16It has paved the way for a generation of researchers focused on women's health.
03:21That is something we never had before.
03:23And yet Trump was going to ax it, presumably because he thinks it's woke to care about women's health.
03:30Then hardly 24 hours later, he claims to have reversed course following a loud public outcry.
03:37Yet the Fred Hutch Cancer Research still has not heard from NIH directly
03:42on if that funding will actually be restored.
03:46Trump's 360 really goes to show you these cuts and firings are not about some big strategy,
03:53just chaos and extortion.
03:56We have seen Trump freeze billions of research dollars for purely political reasons,
04:01putting his own petty grievances ahead of curing cancer and saving lives.
04:07None of us should stand for that, not for a minute.
04:10And just as slashing NIH isn't about a strategy for our country, it's not about efficiency either.
04:18NIH has an incredibly high return on investment.
04:22While medical research accounts for less than 1% of the federal budget,
04:27NIH has contributed to over 99% of drugs approved by FDA in recent years.
04:33And while we're talking about government efficiency, let's not forget the FDA,
04:38which families trust to keep them safe.
04:42Because the NIH breakthrough won't do much good if FDA does not have the staff and resources
04:48they need to approve new drugs.
04:50But Trump cannot gut FDA, push out 4,000 workers,
04:56and expect to maintain that gold standard that keeps food and drugs safe
05:00and gives our nation a competitive edge.
05:03And NIH cuts are not just cutting off promising future research,
05:07but undermining studies we are right in the middle of right now.
05:12One NIH lab that analyzes blood samples for more than 200 trials,
05:18studying cancer treatments, organ transplants, and more,
05:22lost half its staff during Trump and Elon's layoffs.
05:26Right now, in this country, patients in clinical trials are praying for a breakthrough.
05:33They're seeing their best hope cut off by the richest people in the world.
05:37And worse than undermining any one study,
05:40Trump and Musk are also cutting the beating heart out of our medical research enterprise
05:45by pushing talented researchers out the door.
05:49Trump has pushed out nearly 5,000 people at NIH and counting.
05:56China is already trying to seize the moment and recruit some of the brightest talent,
06:01and the same for Europe.
06:03Instead of supporting new talent,
06:05Trump is slashing grants for our early career scientists.
06:09I heard about this firsthand a few weeks ago.
06:13I was out in my state speaking with researchers and students at WSU in Vancouver.
06:18Bright, bright young people who want to do their medical research here are suddenly worried.
06:24Why start that PhD if their funding is going to get yanked away?
06:28Why study new vaccines if RFK Jr. is going to meddle in their work?
06:33Why come to the U.S. for promising research if Trump might just try to deport them for jaywalking?
06:40Make no mistake, the United States is the world leader in medical research.
06:45But creating that was not an accident, and maintaining it is not inevitable.
06:51It is a choice we make through our investments,
06:55one that is paid off on a scale that cannot be measured.
06:58How do you measure the miracle of eliminating a disease, of funding a cure, of developing a new vaccine?
07:07How do you measure giving someone the chance to become a parent or to see their grandkids?
07:13You can't.
07:14Which leads me to the question I hope we focus on today.
07:18Why on earth would we let Trump slash that all to ribbons?
07:22Why on earth would we give up on Alzheimer's research, or heart disease, or cancer?
07:29I will tell you, I am not giving up on patients.
07:31I am not giving up on cures.
07:33I suspect many others here feel the same.
07:36So I hope this discussion today helps us focus on that common ground,
07:41and that working together, we can push back on these devastating cuts
07:44and push forward the research that is so important to folks back home.