The MAHA Playbook: How to Privatize Science in Four Easy Steps
Mass firings, funding cuts, and billionaire-backed agendas are dismantling independent science. Here’s why it matters.
After RFK Jr.’s confirmation last week, it was announced that more than 5,200 scientists and public health experts across federal agencies, including the CDC, FDA, and NIH, will be fired. At the same time, NIH research funding is being slashed through a new 15% cap on indirect costs, a move that will gut university research budgets and cut off critical funding for public research institutions. And if that wasn’t enough, the administration is doubling down on its claim that science has been “skewed” and needs to be rebuilt, with the Make America Healthy Again Executive Order framing public health research as untrustworthy.
If you’re wondering why a government that claims it wants to “fix” science is firing thousands of researchers and gutting its funding, you’re not alone.
But this isn’t about making science better. It’s about dismantling public health research so they can privatize it.
This is a deliberate strategy:
Erode trust in science by claiming it’s corrupt.
Defund public science & fire experts
Privatize science, allowing billionaires and corporations to control the research agenda
Let’s break down exactly how they’re pulling this off.
Step 1: Erode Trust in Science
The first step in privatizing science is convincing people it’s broken.
For decades, conservative movements have worked to erode trust in science, framing scientific consensus as biased, ideological, or corrupt to justify slashing funding and weakening regulations. I wrote about the long history of these attacks, going back to Reagan and Bush, in this newsletter, but today, we’re seeing a more aggressive version of the same strategy.
Now, through the MAHA movement, this anti-science rhetoric is being turned against federal health agencies themselves, painting the FDA, CDC, NIH, and others as corrupt institutions that need to be dismantled.
The Trump administration laid the groundwork by proposing a cap on NIH indirect costs and attempting deep cuts to federal research funding across agencies like the NIH and EPA, all while repeatedly portraying universities as “radical left” institutions misusing taxpayer dollars.
RFK Jr., in his partnership with Trump and MAHA, has joined this effort, promoting the idea that federal health agencies are compromised and that public health science cannot be trusted.
Instead of blaming politicians for failing to enact public health policies that could actually improve chronic disease rates, they blame the science itself. They claim rising rates of chronic illness are proof that public research is “flawed” or even “fraudulent,” rather than acknowledging that lawmakers refuse to act on decades of scientific evidence.
They frame government-funded research as “wasteful” and inefficient, without acknowledging that this funding is essential for basic research, medical breakthroughs, and scientific advancements that private industry often won’t invest in because they aren't immediately profitable.
This isn’t an accident. The goal is to make people doubt all public science so that when they gut it, no one fights back.
And here’s the irony: By undermining trust in government-funded research and cutting agencies like the NIH, they are actually making public science more dependent on private industry funding (like from Big Pharma).
Step 2: Defund Public Science & Fire Experts
Once they have undermined trust in public research, the next step is to defund it.
After an intentional and aggressive campaign calling public science wasteful, corrupt, or broken, they now have the justification they need to strip away funding and fire the very scientists responsible for critical research.
More than 5,200 employees, including scientists and public health experts, are being fired from federal agencies like the CDC, FDA, and NIH. These are not political appointees but include many career professionals who have dedicated their work to public health, often choosing lower-paying government roles over more lucrative private sector jobs because they believe in serving the public and advancing science for the common good.
The NIH’s 15% cap on indirect costs is a direct attack on university research. This funding covers essential expenses like lab space, research staff, and infrastructure, and without it, many research programs will be forced to shut down.
At the same time, the administration attempted to freeze all new federal grant funding, placing an immediate halt on scientific research, public health initiatives, and social programs. The order required all pending and existing grants to be reviewed for alignment with the administration’s policy priorities, giving political appointees the power to cancel already-approved research funding if it didn’t fit their agenda.
Public science has already been underfunded for decades. While overall science budgets have fluctuated, key agencies like the FDA and NIH have often been underfunded relative to their growing responsibilities. This chronic underfunding has forced them to rely more heavily on private industry fees and grants because Congress has not consistently provided the resources needed to sustain independent research. Now, they’re accelerating this shift, ensuring that the only science left standing is privately funded and controlled.
And once federal research institutions are gutted, the next phase begins—privatization.
Step 3: Privatize Science & Control the Research Agenda
Once public science is gutted, the next step is privatization, shifting control of research to those with financial and ideological interests, and leading to even greater health disparities.
When scientific funding is dictated by profit rather than public good, research priorities shift dramatically. Corporations and billionaires decide what gets studied, meaning diseases that aren’t profitable (or don’t align with their agenda) receive little to no funding. Public interest research, including studies on maternal health, rare diseases, and social determinants of health, gets neglected. And while many reputable private funders follow rigorous scientific standards, corporations and billionaires can selectively publish findings, withhold negative results, or shape research agendas to align with their interests. This allows funders to shape what “science” gets recognized while burying inconvenient findings.
This is already happening.
Last week, Nicole Shanahan, RFK Jr.’s former running mate, posted on X offering $3.5 million to “qualified researchers” willing to publish papers linking vaccines to a series of unproven medical syndromes. In other words, she’s paying people to validate anti-vaccine theories, which is a deeply unethical move that funds science with a predetermined agenda rather than genuine inquiry. This isn’t about unbiased discovery. It’s about controlling the narrative.
And it’s not just individuals like Shanahan pushing this agenda, it’s a coordinated effort to turn science into a business. Calley Means, a key MAHA orchestrator, openly admitted as much over the weekend in a post on Instagram:
"To my friends in the medical community who think RFK Jr. is an attack on science: It’s time for productive action… I promise you - the goal of this administration is to rejuvenate science. To get to the bottom of why we are getting sick and ensure companies and people who reverse those trends make a lot of money."
They aren’t strengthening science - they’re reshaping it to serve private profits.
And privatization doesn’t just shift power, it widens health disparities. Public research ensures health advancements benefit everyone. But when corporations take over, treatments are developed based on profitability, not public need, leading to exclusive, high-cost medical breakthroughs while preventive care and public health research (areas that don’t generate high returns) are deprioritized. The impact will hit hardest in marginalized communities, where chronic disease, environmental health risks, and maternal health crises already receive too little attention.
Step 4: Control Science, Control Public Health
When research is privatized, public health policy is no longer shaped by what’s best for society, it’s shaped by profit.
Without independent, publicly funded science, we lose the ability to:
Set evidence-based health policies. Private funders can influence regulatory decisions, suppress findings that hurt their bottom line, and push policies that serve financial interests over public well-being.
Ensure transparency in health and safety standards. Government-funded research is designed to serve the public, not corporate profit. When corporations control science, they dictate what gets studied (and what doesn’t).
Address systemic health issues. Public research plays a critical role in studying racial health disparities, environmental risks, and disease prevention. Without it, these issues could be ignored or buried.
Privatizing research doesn’t just shape science, it shapes who gets access to health care and whose health problems matter. That means:
Less research on social determinants of health. If poverty, pollution, or corporate practices contribute to poor health, there’s no incentive for private funders to study it, especially if findings could lead to regulation.
More medical advancements only for those who can pay. Without public research, life-saving treatments become expensive and inaccessible to those who need them most.
The rise of alternative “science” to justify ideological agendas. As we've seen with Nicole Shanahan’s funding offer for anti-vaccine studies, billionaires can pay to validate misinformation under the guise of "scientific inquiry."
Public research drives medical advancements, studies rare diseases, and reduces health inequities, areas that private industry often ignores because they aren’t profitable. Without it, long-term scientific breakthroughs decline, disparities widen, and entire fields of critical research, like rare diseases, environmental health, and preventive medicine, are deprioritized in favor of profitable ventures.
The Bottom Line
The MAHA Commission executive order and the movement behind it isn’t about making science more transparent or fixing research funding. It’s about erasing decades of independent public science so that private corporations can fill the void.
If they succeed the public will lose access to unbiased health research, corporations and billionaires will control what science gets funded and published, and the focus of research will shift from public health to profit.
And they’re not even hiding it—MAHA insiders have said outright that the goal is to shift research incentives toward profit, ensuring that those who "reverse disease" will make a lot of money.
They aren’t trying to fix science. They’re trying to take it over. And once they do, the consequences will be devastating for public health.
What Can You Do?
Support federal research funding. It’s the best defense against billionaire-funded “alternative science.”
Support science communicators. Privatization depends on public trust in science being eroded, so supporting people who are explaining the science is important.
Hold politicians accountable. Don’t let them use “wasteful government spending” as an excuse to gut public research.
Science should serve the public good, not private profit. And right now, that principle is being undermined in favor of privatization and corporate profits.
Thank you for this!