White House releases appropriated NIH funds after bipartisan congressional backlash

The White House on Tuesday released some federal funding for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) that had been locked up, after bipartisan backlash from Congress. 

A group of 14 Senate Republicans urged the White House to disburse the funds last week, which had already been approved by Congress. White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought previously claimed the NIH needed a “dramatic overhaul” and that his office was going "line by line" to ensure it was properly funded.

The OMB said all NIH funding for biomedical and public health research has now been released, and claimed the freeze was due to “a programmatic review," per Politico. However, the new funds do not account for all the NIH money Congress has called on the OMB to release.

Republican senators have warned that delaying funds that were already approved for certain agencies could hurt public trust in the federal government and even American citizens.

The funding was approved in Congress' stopgap government funding package that was passed and signed by President Donald Trump earlier this year.

Misty Severi is a news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.