I don't think China needs the kind of scientists disproportionately affected by the bad orange man's vendetta.

The chaos is affecting pretty much all areas of science, not just the controversial ones. I work in non-controversial, pretty run-of-the-mill chemistry research and the attacks on the NSF have certainly impacted our funding situation. Very long delays in proposal review, complete pivoting to AI, etc. I have co-workers panicking over the green card changes. And the overall morale is pretty grim everywhere.

Edit: don’t forget how he’s forcing NSF headquarters to move. All the NSF, not just the “bad” research.

Almost everyone has entertained the idea of leaving the US for more stability, which is required for research.

Well if they want to stop all improvements to their electric car industry that is letting them out compete European, Japanese and US manufacturers, solar panels have clearly not been important to them, and their rocket programs don’t need anyone working on transfer orbits and god forbid anyone describes the materials they test as “diverse”…

You mean Vaccine researchers? Or renewable energy researchers?