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US ‘science refugees’ arrive at French university after Trump spending cuts

Eight researchers who left the US as a result of President Donald Trump’s spending cuts have arrived at France’s University of Aix-Marseille as part of a programme designed to attract American academics.

Eight American researchers have arrived at a university in southern France, as the country pushes to offer “science asylum” to US academics hit by federal research spending cuts under US President Donald Trump.

The University of Aix-Marseille (AMU) welcomed the scholars on Thursday, following the March launch of its “Safe Place for Science” initiative, the first among 20 set to relocate there in coming months.

The programme has already drawn nearly 300 applicants from top institutions such as Stanford, NASA, and Berkeley.

The development comes as US universities have been threatened since Trump’s return to the White House with massive federal funding cuts, causing research programmes to face closures.

France offers academic refuge from Trump-era pressure

AMU – one of France’s largest universities, with some 12,000 international students alone – is eager to provide a home for these scholars, with research funding for up to three years.

Historian Brian Sandberg said he decided to apply to the university in the southern Provence region on a return trip to the United States from France, when he feared he might face arrest at the border of his own country.

Though he was not detained, “it makes you think about what is your status as a researcher”, said the academic from Illinois whose work focuses on religion, gender and violence.

Academic freedom ‘under attack’

Sandberg is now one of 20 scholars specialising in subjects ranging from health, climate science, astrophysics and the humanities set to relocate to France in September. There, they hope to pursue their research in what they see as a more open academic environment.

“The principle of academic freedom, as well as the entire system of research and higher education in the United States is really under attack,” said Sandberg.

“If I stay in the United States, I can continue to teach, but as a researcher, for the next four years, we’re stuck,” he said, referring to Trump’s term in office.

One academic who requested anonymity said Trump’s policies directly threatened her work on gender and human-caused global warming.

“Apparently, one of the banned words … is ‘female’,” she said. “I don’t know how you can get around speaking about females without using the word,” she said.

In February, the Washington Post reported that the National Science Foundation was flagging research using terms such as “female” and “women” that could violate Trump’s orders rolling back diversity initiatives.

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