David Die Dejean is passionate about studying tuna. Last year, he landed a dream job at National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Miami to pursue his research. By January, he was settled in, had received a good review and loved working with his colleagues, he said.
Then in mid-February he received an email to vacate the premises within 90 minutes.
He and hundreds of others had been dismissed in job cuts targeting probationary workers as U.S. President Donald Trump's new administration began slashing funding for universities and research bodies.
Now Die Dejean is applying for positions in Europe.
"I want to work wherever they allow me to do the research," said the scientist, who studies fish stocks to ensure tuna is being fished sustainably.
"I'm eagerly waiting for some of the things that are coming from the European Union...increasing the opportunities for scientists like me to come back," said Die Dejean, who was born in Spain but has spent most of his career in the U.S. and Australia.
Trump's administration says billions of dollars in cuts are needed to curb the federal deficit and bring the U.S. debt under control.
His cutbacks on research come amid a broader clash that has seen Trump criticize universities as discriminatory for their diversity policies and denounce what he sees as a failure by some institutions to protect Jewish students from antisemitism.
The threat to academics' livelihoods at universities including Yale, Columbia and Johns Hopkins has given Europe's political leaders hope they could reap an intellectual windfall.
A letter, reviewed by Reuters, signed in March by 13 European countries including France, Germany and Spain, urged the EU Commission to move fast to attract academic talent.
The European Research Council, an EU body that finances scientific work, told Reuters it would double the relocation budget for funding researchers moving to the EU to 2 million euros ($2.16 million) per applicant. That goes towards covering the cost of moving to a European institution, which may involve setting up a laboratory.
In Germany, as part of coalition talks for a new government, conservatives and Social Democrats have drawn up plans to lure up to 1,000 researchers, according to negotiation documents from March seen by Reuters that allude to the upheaval in U.S. higher learning.
Reuters spoke to 13 European universities and research institutes that reported seeing an increase in U.S-based employees considering crossing the Atlantic, as well as half a dozen U.S.-based academics pondering a move to Europe.
"Regulatory uncertainty, funding cuts, immigration restrictions, and diminished international collaboration create a perfect storm for brain drain," said Gray McDowell at U.S. digital consultancy firm Capgemini Invent.
A White House official said the administration is analysing research grants and prioritizing funding for areas likely to deliver returns for taxpayers "or some sort of meaningful scientific advancement". The NOAA cuts were designed to avoid compromising its ability to do its duties, the official added.
EUROPEAN MOMENTUM
Pulling in U.S. talent to Europe requires more than good will though. It requires money.
For decades, Europe has lagged far behind the U.S. on investment in its seats of higher learning.
Total expenditure on research and development in the EU among businesses, governments, universities and private non-profit organizations in 2023 was 381 billion euros ($411 billion), according to the latest figures by Eurostat - the statistical office of the European Union.
That same year, total research and experimental development in the U.S. was estimated at $940 billion, according to the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, a federal agency that provides data on the performance of science and engineering in the U.S.
And while the U.S's richest university, Harvard, has an endowment worth $53.2 billion, that of Britain's wealthiest, Oxford, is only 8.3 billion pounds ($10.74 billion).
One academic and an expert in academia said, even with a concerted and substantial effort, Europe would likely need a long time to overturn that spending advantage.
"I don't foresee a rapid build-up of additional scientific capability that could match what the U.S. now has...for several decades", Michael Oppenheimer, a Professor of Geosciences and International Affairs at Princeton, told Reuters.
The White House official said even with the cuts, the U.S. would still account for the most global research funding, adding: "Europe is not going to and cannot fill the void."
Dozens of scientists have taken to social media encouraging peers to stay in the U.S., while others acknowledge a number of drawbacks may deter them from moving.
Michael Olesen, director of an infection prevention program for a healthcare system in Washington, D.C., said language barriers were one potential drawback, as were unfamiliar laws and employment practices.
Salary is another.
"My impression is that I would get paid a lot less as an anesthesiologist in Europe," said Holden K. Groves, an Assistant Professor of Anaesthesiology at Columbia University, which received funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). "It's a huge ordeal to change."
Still, Europe's political leaders feel the stance of the Trump administration has put the wind in their sails.
"The American government is currently using brute force against the universities in the USA, so that researchers from America are now contacting Europe," Germany's chancellor-in-waiting, Friedrich Merz, said last month.
"This is a huge opportunity for us."
John Tuthill, a American neuroscience professor at the University of Washington in Seattle, is assessing his options. He cannot apply for new funding to plan beyond 2027 because grant applications have now been frozen.
The lab of 17 people he runs gets about three-quarters of its funding from the NIH, where the Trump administration has earmarked major cuts.
"Europe is the obvious one, because it is the other hub of biomedical research in the world," said Tuthill, who is originally from Maine, adding he is weighing up a move with his wife and daughter.
Aix Marseille University in France told Reuters it had received interest from 120 researchers at institutions in the U.S., including NASA and Stanford, for a 15-million euro 'safe space for science' programme launched on March 7. The initiative aims to attract U.S. staff from fields including health, LGBT+ medicine, epidemiology and climate change.
"Our colleagues were frightened...It was our duty to rise to the occasion," university director Eric Berton said, noting 10 European universities have contacted him about launching similar programs.
In the Netherlands, the government wants to establish a fund to attract top foreign scientists and bolster the EU's 'strategic autonomy' aims, Education Minister Eppo Bruins said in a letter to parliament on 20 March.
That marks a policy shift as the government had previously announced plans to cut half a billion euros in research and higher education.
Eindhoven Tech University President Robert-Jan Smits told Reuters that bringing in U.S. scientists could boost Europe's technological sovereignty in areas like semiconductors.
Belgium's sister universities Vrije Universiteit Brussel and Université Libre de Bruxelles have launched a scheme encouraging U.S.-based researchers to apply for 36 postdoctoral positions. And the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, which promotes the exchange of top scientists to Germany, plans to increase its programs by about 20 percent.
The Grantham Institute at Imperial College London, which specialises in climate change research, is creating at least two more research fellowship posts for early-career climate researchers from the U.S. and has already seen an clear uptick in applications, said its Director of Research, Joeri Rogelj.
Sarah Weisberg, a fisheries biologist at the National Marine Fisheries Service, based in Woods Hole Massachusetts, said she was fired in February's probationary cuts and has since been offered a job in Europe.
"I had not ever considered taking [my career] to Europe," she told Reuters. "Now, I kind of have no choice but to think that way."
© Thomson Reuters 2025.
16 Comments
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virusrex
It would be nice if other countries could simply take charge and the generation of scientists that inevitably will be lost on the US could be replaced with one from other countries, unfortunately the sheer amount of researchers that are being cut in the US is several times more than what other countries can absorb. This means that only a fraction of minds will be rescued from the debacle (still a huge benefit mainly for Europe) but most of the cut scientists will abandon research or at least academia (for a much higher benefit for companies that work mainly for profit instead of social progress).
Japan in comparison is not nearly as attractive as european countries, but it seems that it is also going to benefit, those institutions (mostly national universities) that can absorb foreign researchers are getting unsolicited applications for all levels, which of course it making things difficult for Japanese researchers that now have stronger competition.
Wasabi
trump does not understand sciences. Your lost and our gain.
Maga, so much win, right?
I'veSeenFootage
The consequences of Trump's dumbing down of America will be felt for decades to come. He will without a shadow of a doubt go down in history as the worst president the USA ever had, but also one of the worst presidents in the history of the world.
HopeSpringsEternal
Govt. based science and tech., way behind the times, DJT knows all real talent in the private sector these days!
Peter14
Trump throwing away the US advantage in research across the board. Unless they do what China does and begin to steal other nations IP they will find themselves falling behind.
No doubt when the Democrats are elected to fix all Trumps damage to America, they will look to rehire and reboot research in the US.
The next President who will be Democrat, is going to be spending his/her entire term repairing all Trumps damage to American institutions and to Americas international reputation which is all but in tatters right now.
Unless as everyone suspects, Trump runs again illegally and rigs the next and all future elections like his buddy Putin has done in Russia. If that happens, American liberties and freedoms will be all but gone for good.
virusrex
Government based science and technology was what gave an advantage to the US, leaving things to the private sector means only those things that bring profit to companies will advance, and will replace anything that was even remotely affordable for the population.
Unfortunately even if Trump was impeached today and a democrat president magically elected the same day a lot of the damage is already done and will take years if not decades to be recovered.
In research stability is paramount, and research projects do not tolerate pauses, this means that things that have been moving for 5-6 years and are suddenly stopped by suspension of funding are effectively dropped without hope for the incomplete work to be recovered without doing everything from the beginning.
Then you add careers that are finished, laboratories that took many years to put in order being disbanded, patients that had to be painfully screened and followed before being introduced into multiyear studies, epidemiological information that now is no longer being collected, etc. etc. and it becomes clear that lots of the work has been simply destroyed.
Finally it is also important trust that is no longer there, collaborations with other institutions overseas are not going to be formed again when there is always the chance of the american population electing another antiscientific president, patients will not assume again risks when they have been abandoned mid trials without their effort ending in anything useful, foreign postgraduate students (a huge part of the workforce in laboratories) will not bet their careers if they can be deported without even due process if a president so wishes.
It takes a lot of effort to destroy the scientific advantage the US had, but a combination of really weird complacency from the general population and unexplainable anticipatory obedience from universities made this destruction progress very smoothly, something may be recovered, but to get to the same point as it was last year it will take orders of magnitude more money, effort and time.
HopeSpringsEternal
Disagree, great research at US Universities continues full-stop, due to partnerships with business community, especially in areas like IT and pharma to name a few.
Ivory Tower, like Big Inefficient Wasteful Govt. itself has been dying a LONG time, due to Poor ROI/results.
wallace
Trump is attacking the universities and canceling grants if they don't bend to his will.
HopeSpringsEternal
Universities are not another form of 'sanctuary' cities, and thus they're $funding from US Govt contingent upon abiding by laws of the land. DJT has made that clear as day and is willing to cut funding to compel lawful behavior.
Namahage
@HopeSpringsEternal
Have you ever ,like myself,listened to more well-informed opinions,and had the humility to revise your previously held opinions?
virusrex
A fraction of what was active last year, without actual justification above what Trump wanted stopped, even if that mean unethically dropping clinical studies and abandoning the patients against what is accepted as the minimum responsibility the NIH assumes while enrolling patients.
NIH research is one of the most productive ways to invest public funds, not only because of the results that it brings, but because it activates the economy way over what is directly used. Calling progress wasteful is just an excuse used by antiscientific propaganda to justify stopping cold live saving research that made the US stay for many years at the front of research in many field, a position it is now stepping down from to support billionaires instead.
There have been exactly zero examples of unlawful behavior being used to justify the cuts, zero. A deeply confused person that can't understand the difference between transsexual and transgenic is simply choosing to support billionaires with tax cuts instead of life saving research that bring countless benefits to the population. Making progress against the law is not a justification, is just describing how a president well known for his antiscientific bias weakens the US leadership in many fields giving an unexpected gift to any other country willing to pick up professionals leaving the country.
I mean, when scientists are opposing politicians and you choose the side of the politicians you are making obvious you are choosing the immoral side willingly.
Cephus
AI is already making their jobs redundant anyways in one way or the other some could have gone home
virusrex
AI can barely make single tasks in well controlled environments, to say it could replace the scientists in charge of planning, executing, analyzing and validating research is like saying that you don't need math teachers because you can have a pocket calculator.
bass4funk
Well, they shouldn't get a dime if they are attacking Jewish students and these institutions do nothing to protect them. Besides they have more than enough money, way too much, they will be fine.
Yrral
A MAGA mind is terrible thing to waste,since lots of them are mindless
virusrex
Protesting the war is not the same as attacking students. So your argument is based on false assumptions.
Science requires money to be done, complaining about it makes no sense when you keep using the products of that research yourself. Not to count, spending on research is one of the most productive ways to use money. Literally billions of dollars are being wasted by abruptly ending research that could have finished soon and whose results are now worthless.
https://www.nih.gov/about-nih/what-we-do/impact-nih-research/serving-society/direct-economic-contributions