Coalition Urges Congress to Restore NSF to $9.9 Billion — Deadline April 13
April 5, 2026 · 2 min read
Arthur Griffin
A broad coalition of research organizations is pressing the U.S. Senate to fund the National Science Foundation at $9.9 billion in fiscal year 2027 — a level that would restore the agency to its FY2023 funding and reverse cuts enacted in 2024 and 2026.
Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) is circulating a Dear Colleague Letter seeking Senate co-signers, with a deadline of noon ET on Monday, April 13, 2026. The effort is coordinated by the Coalition for National Science Funding and backed by organizations including the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, the American Institute of Biological Sciences, the Association of American Universities, and dozens more.
Why $9.9 Billion and Why Now
NSF currently operates on $8.75 billion for FY2026, supporting nearly 10,000 new awards and more than 250,000 scientists, technicians, teachers, and students. But advocates argue that number falls far short of the ambitions Congress itself set in the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act.
"Actual funding continues to lag significantly behind authorized levels," the coalition letter states, resulting in "billions of dollars in lost opportunities for American discovery."
The $9.9 billion figure is not arbitrary — it matches the FY2023 level before successive appropriations cycles trimmed the agency's budget. With NSF allocating nearly 94 percent of its funding directly to research projects, facilities, and STEM education, even modest cuts ripple across thousands of university labs and training programs.
What This Means for Grant Seekers
NSF-funded researchers and institutions should take two immediate steps. First, contact your U.S. Senators before April 13 and request they sign the Markey letter. The American Institute of Biological Sciences has published a call to action with direct outreach tools.
Second, monitor NSF's priority areas — artificial intelligence, quantum information science, biotechnology, and translational science — which will likely receive outsized attention regardless of the final topline number.
Grant seekers tracking federal science funding can find agency-by-agency analysis at grantedai.com.
For full analysis of how FY2027 appropriations could reshape NSF funding, visit the Granted blog.