Changes Expected to Policy Priorities Following Election

United States Presidential Election

President-Elect Joe Biden’s term as 46th President of the United States begins January 20th, 2021. Under the Biden Administration, we expect to see significant changes to a number of higher education and research-based policy priorities made public during the campaign.

Higher Education and Immigration

Priorities for the Biden Administration include doubling the Pell Grant; pandemic relief aid for higher education; protections for DACA/Dreamers; addressing concerns over the new Title IX regulations; and student loan relief. The President-Elect has announced his intent to overturn the Trump Administration’s Executive Orders (EOs) regulating international students within his first 100 days in office.

Research and Development

A focal point for the Biden campaign was the need to expand R&D in the US in order to remain competitive on the international stage. We can expect to see a shift in how the new Administration will engage in climate research, with agencies like NASA, NSF, NOAA and the EPA all seeing increased budget recommendations for work on climate and climate change. This will also include the US signing back on to the Paris Climate Agreement. The President-Elect has also indicated an interest in creating a new climate agency modeled after the Department of Defense’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which funds high-risk/high-reward research. This will require Senate approval, the majority party of which is not yet determined pending two Georgia runoff elections in January. President-Elect Biden intends to bring significant changes to NIH, where his administration is expected to engage on issues of cancer research, open data and data sharing, and infectious diseases as related to pandemic scale viruses. Broadly, we will see the Administration encouraging inter-university partnership between established R1 research universities and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs). University of Arizona is uniquely positioned as both an Hispanic-Serving Institution and an R1 research institution holding status as a member of the Association of American Universities, and we will work closely with the new administration to develop research policies that best serve the nation.

Congressional Update

Arizona welcomes new Senator-Elect Mark Kelly to Congress, who will serve out the remainder of the late John McCain’s term, previously held by Senator Martha McSally, ending in 2023. Senator-Elect Kelly is expected to be a strong supporter of both R&D and higher education priorities, and we look forward to working with him and his staff on shared goals for advancing those priorities. As mentioned above, with the Georgia Senate races going to runoff elections, it is unknown at this time whether the Senate will flip from a Republican majority to a Democrat majority. If the Senate flips, there will be more to share on what that means for the next several years. Our team had a very good working relationship with Senator McSally and her staff, and we thank them for their service.