Dear Mr. President-elect,

In the last four years, federally funded science agencies were unmade and remade. They were given new marching orders. The mandate of providing the nation with unbiased scientific advice was replaced by a new mandate—that science is subordinate to the political goals and ego of President Trump.

The consequences of this new mandate are serious and far-reaching. The Environmental Protection Agency became the Environmental Pollution Agency, rolling back protections on clean air and clean water, and providing regulatory relief to President Trump’s campaign contributors from the fossil fuel industry. Scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration were censured for challenging President Trump’s incorrect forecast of the path of a major hurricane. Their sin? Failing to adhere to the prime directive that the president is never wrong. At multiple federal agencies, climate science became “the subject that must not be named”—and the subject that should not be studied. And most recently, federally funded scientists unwilling to support the president’s incorrect narrative of a country “rounding the corner” […]