By Vanguard Staff
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Union leaders and top state officials are pushing back forcefully against reports that President Donald Trump is weighing a proposal to cancel all federal research grant funding for California’s public university systems, a move critics are calling vindictive, illegal and economically disastrous.
On Friday, CNN and other outlets reported that Trump, in his bid to return to the White House, was “specifically considering a full termination of federal grant funding for the University of California and California State University systems” should he win a second term, which he did. The report set off alarm bells across California’s political and academic circles, prompting swift condemnation from the union representing tens of thousands of academic workers in the state.
UAW (United Auto Workers) Local 4811, which represents more than 48,000 academic employees across the University of California system—including postdoctoral scholars, academic researchers, graduate student workers and academic student employees—issued a sharp rebuke of the proposal, calling it a direct attack on science, education and the economy.
“The Trump administration’s proposal to stop vital research efforts in California shows how little they care about workers, the economy, and progress in medicine and technology,” the union said in a statement. “Donald Trump may not understand the economic importance of basic research, but Californians do.”
According to the union, federal research investments in California support more than 55,000 jobs directly and sustain hundreds of thousands more indirectly through innovation, patent development, and local economic activity. The statement emphasized that federal research funding has helped California produce transformative technological breakthroughs—such as the development of the internet, modern leukemia treatments, and smartphones.
“California makes enormous contributions to patent creation, and UAW academic workers at the University of California alone help generate new patents every day,” the statement read.
UAW 4811 argued that cutting federal research dollars would damage not just California but the broader U.S. economy, and would effectively punish the nation’s largest and most productive donor state.
“Moving forward with these proposals would cripple the world’s fourth largest economy,” the statement continued. “Californians are aware that we send $83 billion more to the national Treasury annually than we use, and that those funds are used to promote the public good across the country. The negative effects of this decision will ripple outward, stalling research and development efforts and the economic benefits that come with them. Ultimately, this attack on California will harm nearly everyone in the country.”
As details of the Trump proposal spread, California Gov. Gavin Newsom took to social media to blast the idea and suggest the state consider taking drastic retaliatory action. In a post on X, formerly Twitter, Newsom pointed to the state’s outsized contributions to the federal budget, citing a Rockefeller Institute analysis showing California paid $83 billion more in federal taxes in 2022 than it received back from Washington.
“Californians pay the bills for the federal government. We pay over $80 BILLION more in taxes than we get back,” Newsom wrote. “Maybe it’s time to cut that off.”
The idea of withholding federal tax contributions, while constitutionally murky and politically fraught, was also floated by Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas, who denounced the rumored research grant cancellations as “unconstitutional and vindictive.”
“We’re the nation’s economic engine and the largest donor state, and deserve our fair share,” Rivas said in a post on the social media platform Bluesky. “I’ll use every legal and constitutional tool available to defend CA—we must look at every option, including withholding federal taxes.”
State Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire also weighed in, calling the reports “this president’s illegal and unprecedented attack on our state,” though he stopped short of backing tax resistance.
In Washington, Trump-aligned officials sought to tamp down speculation while still taking aim at California’s political leadership. White House spokesperson Kush Desai told Politico that no final decision had been made but condemned the state for what he called “lunatic anti-energy, soft-on-crime, pro-child mutilation, and pro-sanctuary policies.”
“The Trump administration is committed to ending this nightmare and restoring the California Dream,” Desai said.
Trump has previously used threats of federal funding cuts to target California over immigration, environmental and LGBTQ+ policies. In 2024, he threatened to withhold funds if a transgender athlete was allowed to compete in a state girls’ track meet. Legal experts have consistently raised constitutional concerns about using federal appropriations as political weapons, particularly when it involves punishing specific states.
UAW 4811 warned that regardless of whether Trump’s latest threat materializes, the damage to public higher education could be compounded if state leaders move ahead with their own proposed cuts. Gov. Newsom’s May budget revision included reductions to UC and CSU funding as part of a broader effort to close a $45 billion budget shortfall.
“These threats to federal funding mean the state government has more responsibility than ever to protect higher education,” the union stated. “We are therefore calling on Governor Newsom to retract all proposed state budget cuts to the UC and CSU in the coming budget year, and to take strong action against the Trump administration’s attacks on public higher education in California.”
The union’s statement concluded with a pledge to resist political interference in science, public education and labor.
“Together with our allies, UAW 4811 will fight back against these political attacks against our members, our work and our state. We are committed to science, to democracy, and to social justice. Our solidarity remains our strength.”
Whether Trump’s proposal becomes official policy remains uncertain, but the strong reaction from California’s leadership and labor unions signals a potentially explosive clash ahead, with education, tax policy and federal-state relations at the center of the next stage in the nation’s deepening political divide.
