Earlier today, the Trump administration released its budget request to Congress for Fiscal Year 2019. The release of a budget request is a largely symbolic step in the annual appropriations process. Actual agency and program spending levels are determined by Congress over the course of several months. Additionally, this year, the budget request put forward by the administration is somewhat undermined by the recently approved Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018, which provides $300 billion of relief from sequestration for Fiscal Years 2018 and 2019. The allocations in the president's budget request for FY 2019 were assembled over the course of the last year, largely before the recent budget agreement was reached. The administration did attempt to increase its requests for certain accounts, with new resources provided by the budget agreement, through the release of an addendum.

The initial materials circulated by the administration show largely flat funding requested for the major research agencies.The administration requests $7.472 billion for the National Science Foundation, which is the same as the FY 2017 level. The administration requests level-funding or approximately $33 billion for the National Institutes of Health, when funds detailed in its addendum are included. President Trump also requests level funding at $5.391 billion for the Department of Energy, Office of Science. However, the administration once again proposes eliminating the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E). Additional details will be provided on the budget request in the days ahead.