Brain Drain

America’s Punt on Science

Welcome back to The American Times, where I cover a story every week from America’s past and relate it to America’s present. This week we’re talking about science, one of the country’s greatest job creators and drivers of soft power. Also, you might notice this week I’m publishing on a Wednesday morning, which will be the new day going forward. As always, thank you for reading. Now let’s get to the story…

It was early March in 1938, and the tanks were about to roll into Vienna. The Karplus family knew it was time to flee. The family had thrived in the Austrian capital for generations: Johann Paul Karplus had been a neurologist who discovered an area of the brain called the hypothalamus, which regulates body temperature and hunger. His son, Eduard Karplus, had been an engineer and an inventor. Another relative, Eugenie Goldstern, had been among the first female anthropologists in Europe. But they were also Jewish. Even as most Austrians embraced the “Anchluss” that connected Nazi Germany to Austria, the Karplus family—including the youngest, Martin, who was just days away from his 8^th birthday—knew it was time to escape.

Soon, Martin found himself on a train to Zurich along with his older brother, Robert, and his mother for a “ski vacation.” Initially, Martin’s father was arrested in Vienna as he sought reunification with his family. After a few weeks in Zurich, Martin, Robert and their mother left for Le Havre, France, where they hoped to book their travel to the United States as the mother assured her boys that their father would be fine. Just days before they set sail, their father arrived. By the fall, the four of them were on a boat to New York, arriving early on the morning of October 8, 1938 as the Statue of Liberty was cast in the glowing, orange light of the dawn. The Karplus family was safe in America.

From the start, it had been clear that both boys—Robert and Martin—were brilliant. And it became clear as the years went on that they would have their pick when it came to college. Back in Vienna, now removed from the grip of the Third Reich, there was a great university, too: the University of Vienna. In fact, the man who had won the Nobel Prize the year Martin Karplus was born in 1930, Karl Landsteiner, had studied there. Other famed minds like Sigmeund Freud had also studied at the University of Vienna. But by the time he was applying, Martin Karplus was an American. The United States had welcomed him and his family at its most vulnerable moment. The universities of Europe would not suffice. For an adopted son of Massachusetts, only one place made sense: Harvard University. In fact, he did not even apply anywhere else. 

At Harvard, Karplus decided to study Chemistry. He received a full scholarship, allowing him to live on campus, rather than at home. Eventually, after graduating, Karplus returned to Harvard to become a Professor of Chemistry beginning in 1966, remaining in the same post for the rest of his life. Despite interest from institutions he had visited in the intervening years, like Cal Tech, Princeton, and Columbia, only Harvard had the resources and depth of talent to attract a mind like Karplus. In the end, it worked out for him: in 2013, he received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Of course, Karplus wasn’t the first Harvard graduate to win the Nobel Prize. There have been around 160 of those. In fact, he wasn’t even the first Harvard graduate to escape Nazi-occupation in 1938 to win the Nobel Prize. That honor belonged to a man named Henry Kissinger. 

But Karplus’ story stands out because it represented a continental shift—literally—in how science developed in the last 85 years. Prior to 1940, groundbreaking scientific research in the century prior had been mostly a European affair. Louis Pastuer had established Germ theory in the 19^th century. Alexander Fleming, a Scot, had discovered penicillin in 1928. You know—all that stuff you learned in the 10^th Grade and had forgotten until just now. The point is: even into the 20^th Century, Europeans—for the most part anyway—led the way in the world of scientific research. 

But then, beginning in the 1940s, that all changed. In 1944, as WWII ended, President Roosevelt commissioned Vannevar Bush, then the Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, to study how the United States could invest in technology and research that could change the world. Bush’s report was titled, “Science, The Endless Frontier,” and laid out how the United States government could become the driving force behind scientific and technological research for the entire world, by investing heavily in its progress. A key part, Bush argued, would be by supporting education and the institutions that served the world’s best minds, whether they were born in the United States or not. This way, the United States could become the leader of entire industries, and the gatekeeper to both the jobs and capital of the future. Investment in education, Bush essentially argued, would be how the U.S. maintained its most vital form of soft power. 

The report led directly to the creation of the National Science Foundation, and the expansion of the National Institutes of Health. Soon, the United States government began investing massive sums of money in universities, research laboratories, and hospitals, creating thousands of jobs and leading to billions of dollars in investments into American companies. Entire new industries, such as biotech, pharmaceuticals, semiconductors and information technology became the drivers of a new global economy that was built upon the sweat of researchers in American labs, many of which were filled with scientists and engineers who had been born outside of the United States. 

America, having just led the free world to victory in World War II, decided to double down on itself by welcoming the world’s greatest minds to its halls of power and innovation. Rather than shun those who wanted to come or play keep-away with grant money that funded things like cancer research, the United States invested in itself. 

But now, we have punted on that responsibility. If the Trump Administration had its way—and it well could—it’s possible that Martin Karplus would not have been able to study at Harvard. And even if he had, Harvard wouldn’t have access to the funds that made Karplus’ research possible. The President is determined to exercise an American brain drain by fiat. In his view, the United States’ most storied institutions should not continue to be hubs for innovation, lifesaving research, and job creation because something-something “woke.” As one physicist, Michael Lubell, at the City University of New York told Nature, “The message that this sends to young scientists is that this country is not a place for you. If I were starting my career, I would be out of here in a heartbeat.”

The Trump Administration’s 2026 budget calls for a funding reduction of the US National Science Foundation (NSF) by 56% and would slash the budget of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) by roughly 40%. In real time, we are undercutting the future of American industrial and technological might—which would otherwise doubtless create millions of jobs and through scientific breakthroughs save countless lives—because the Administration does not want to empower institutions it has chosen not to like. It is the worst form of cowardice: making a bad decision out of spite, and out of one person’s continued ability to be offended by nearly everything. 

And to be clear: this doesn’t just kill the truth, it kills jobs. As of 2023, 36 million American workers—24 percent of the workforce—worked a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) related job. For reference, that’s more jobs than retail and construction workers combined. We should be expanding these jobs, not cutting their funding, especially at a moment when China is taking advantage of our failure to lead at this very moment.

At a deep level, Americans understand this. We all want the United States to lead the world in, well, everything. I certainly do. We should be leading the industries of today and creating the industries of tomorrow. We should be empowering anyone and any institution that wants to cure cancer, reduce heart disease, end Alzheimer’s, stop AIDS, or understand fully how the human brain works—regardless of where they are born or who they voted for. The world’s greatest minds should come here to study, live, pay taxes, and teach others what they know. I want the best people the world has to offer in America saving American lives and supporting American businesses. That has nothing to do with “viewpoint diversity” or liberal ideology. That’s called patriotism. Having it any other way is just stupid. Or, as Vannevar Bush put it much more eloquently back in 1945, “Without scientific progress, no amount of achievement in other directions can insure our health, prosperity, and security as a nation.”

Sources:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/13/science/martin-karplus-dead.html

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/03/17/trumps-agenda-is-undermining-american-science

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2013/karplus/biographical/