Trump administration jeopardises key report on climate change

The Trump administration has dismissed all of the nearly 400 researchers working on the next US National Climate Assessment, a move likely to delay – if not prevent – the completion of this key report on how climate change is affecting the country.

“The Trump administration senselessly took a hatchet to a crucial and comprehensive U.S. climate science report by dismissing its authors without cause or a plan,” Rachel Cleetus at the Union of Concerned Scientists, an author of the report, said in a statement.

The move is the latest blow to work on the 6th National Climate Assessment, a sweeping analysis meant to inform both federal and state governments about the risks climate change poses – and what the US is doing about it. A 1990 law passed by the US Congress mandates that the government produce such an assessment every four years.

The next report isn’t due until 2027, but work was already under way on the massive compendium, which can often run to over a thousand pages. The previous assessment, published in 2023, described compounding climate impacts across the country that “are making it harder to maintain safe homes and healthy families; reliable public services; a sustainable economy; thriving ecosystems, cultures, and traditions; and strong communities”.

Earlier in April, the Trump administration cancelled a contract for a consulting group that was coordinating research on the next assessment, working under the US Global Change Research Program. This followed widespread firings across scientific agencies that contribute to the report, as well as other steps the administration has taken to limit climate and weather research.

But there was still hope that the report’s authors – most of whom are volunteers – could cobble something together, says Dustin Mulvaney at San José State University in California, who was working on a section of the report focused on the US Southwest. “A lot of us were like, ‘OK, we can still do this!’”

Now, with all the authors of the report disbanded, its completion seems impossible.

A spokesperson for NASA, which operates the Global Change Research Program, declined to comment. But several report authors confirmed for New Scientist that they received a brief message from the programme stating that all authors are being released as the agency reviews the “scope” of the assessment.

The message said that there may be “future opportunities” to contribute. After all, the assessment is legally required by Congress, and the administration could still appoint new authors. Where earlier reports had focused on climate risks, the new assessment was going to concentrate more on how the US is responding to climate change by reducing emissions and adapting infrastructure to make it more resilient.

But even if a report is eventually released, it will be less trustworthy and rigorous, says Mijin Cha at the University of California, Santa Cruz, who was working on the part of the report about reducing emissions. “Now, they’ve totally sullied it.”

“I think everybody is just really gutted about it,” she says.