Woke Science and the White House

The Trump administration has canceled federal contracts worth millions from Springer Nature, a German-owned scientific publisher. Approximately. $20 million in government grants for journal subscriptions have been rescinded, with potentially “billions more in grants and contracts to be soon retracted. Springer Nature publishes over 3,000 journals, including Nature and Scientific American. Officials have stated that U.S. taxpayer money should not fund what they consider “unused subscriptions to junk science.” This move is unprecedented in the scientific publishing world and is just one of the opening volleys against what the Trump administration has labelled “woke science.”

The Trump administration has initiated a campaign against what it termed “woke science,” particularly by removing specific research terminology from government platforms, reorienting funding priorities, and dismissing scientists it considered aligned with “woke” or progressive views.

Nature Springer is the most important publisher of scientific journals in the world. It was created by the 2015 merger of Springer Science + Business Media, Holtzbrinck Publishing Group’s Nature Publishing Group, Palgrave Macmillan, and Macmillan Education.

According to Retraction Watch, Springer Nature issued 2,923 retractions in 2024 and has had issues with quality control over the past few years. Despite all these retractions, Springer Nature has significantly downplayed the COVID lab-leak theory and refused to retract blatantly false publications that promote the COVID origins being from a natural source. In fact, one paper in Nature Medicine, titled “The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2”, published in May 2020, includes multiple factual misrepresentations and omissions.

The paper begins with the quote:

Prominent scientists and experts, including those who testified before Congress, have stated that the paper meets the criteria for retraction due to “unreliable content” and the misrepresentation of the authors’ true scientific views at the time of publication. Nature has received petitions and thousands of retraction requests for this specific paper, but Nature Springer refuses to retract it. One has to wonder if this is because of its ties with China and the CCP.

Springer Nature has censored content to appease the Chinese government and has acknowledged in 2017 to blocking over 1,000 journal articles in mainland China following government requests. Censored topics include politically sensitive issues to the CCP, like Tibet, Taiwan, the Tiananmen Square protests, elite politics, Uyghur rights, and the Cultural Revolution.

Is Springer Nature, which has a monopoly within specific scientific fields and is the largest and most prestigious academic publisher in the world, openly biased toward leftist politics and policies? Or is the Trump administration blowing rhetorical smoke?

We spent some time examining Springer Nature’s actions and publications over the past decade and have concluded that, yes – in fact, the company does not truly represent the scientific endeavor but has become a mouthpiece for liberal policies supporting a globalist agenda. It also has a “peer review” process that critics believe is dominated by woke groupthink.

To illustrate this point with specific examples, Springer Nature is a signatory of the SDG Publishers Compact, a UN initiative that prioritizes the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN when publishing. The UN’s SDG publishers Compact states that “Signatories aspire to develop sustainable practices and act as champions of the SDGs during the Decade of Action (2020-2030), publishing books and journals that will help inform, develop, and inspire action in that direction.” Action items required by the UN for publishers signing the compact include:

1. Committing to the SDGs: Stating sustainability policies and targets on our website, including adherence to this Compact; incorporating SDGs and their targets as appropriate.

2. Actively promoting and acquiring content that advocates for themes represented by the SDGs, such as equality, sustainability, justice and safeguarding and strengthening the environment.

3. Annually reporting on progress towards achieving SDGs, sharing data and contribute to benchmarking activities, helping to share best practices and identify gaps that still need to be addressed.

4. Nominating a person who will promote SDG progress, acting as a point of contact and coordinating the SDG themes throughout the organization.

5. Raising awareness and promoting the SDGs among staff to increase awareness of SDG-related policies and goals and encouraging projects that will help achieve the SDGs by 2030.

6. Raising awareness and promoting the SDGs among suppliers, to advocate for SDGs and to collaborate on areas that need innovative actions and solutions.

7. Becoming an advocate to customers and stakeholders by promoting and actively communicating about the SDG agenda through marketing, websites, promotions and projects.

8. Collaborating across cities, countries, and continents with other signatories and organizations to develop, localize and scale projects that will advance progress on the SDGs individually or through their Publishing Association.

9. Dedicating budget and other resources towards accelerating progress for SDG-dedicated projects and promoting SDG principles.

10. Taking action on at least one SDG goal, either as an individual publisher or through your national publishing association and sharing progress annually.

Other signatories to this UN pact in the USA include:

Regal House Publishing, Cabells, Global Book Alliance, Hustle For Humanity, Springer Nature, Wiley, Books International, Copyright Clearance Center, Women’s Health and Education Center (WHEC), AIP Publishing, American Society of Civil Engineers, Association of University Presses, Marine Corps University Press, Common Ground Research Networks, E-Lib4All, Partners in Digital Health, LLC, The Gazette of Medical Sciences, Les Presses de l’Université d’Ottawa l University of Ottawa Press, Annual Reviews, Cecilian Publishing, Maximum Academic Press, RTI Press, PLOS, American Geophysical Union, ACS Publications, Iowa State University Digital Press, IEEE, American Physical Society, Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., American Society for Microbiology, COES&RJ LLC. (Centre of Excellence for Scientific & Research Journalism), Iowa State University Digital Press, Iowa State University Library, GeoScienceWorld, National Academy of Sciences, Research Solutions Inc., Princeton University Press, American Speech-Language-Hearing Association.

(Note: that the Marine Corps University Press is an official publication of the United States Marine Corps. President Trump and the WH administration might want to know that the Marine Corps University Press has placed allegiance to the UN sustainability goals above those of the US government!)

However, let’s return to Springer Nature, where the organization prioritizes the UN’s sustainability goals over good science.

Springer Nature has organized its publications into 17 SDG-related content hubs and has launched the following journals themed around those sustainability goals: Nature Climate Change, Nature Energy, Nature Sustainability, Nature Food, Nature Human Behaviour, Nature Water, and Nature Cities.

Springer’s journal, Environment, Development, and Sustainability, was one of a handful of journals to receive the highest possible “Five Wheel” impact rating from the “SDG Impact Intensity journal rating system”, which assessed relevance to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The Springer Nature website is a hub of woke jargon, with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, as well as diversity, equity, social justice, and inclusion, at the focus of editorial decisions. The following screenshots of their various publication policies represent just a tiny fraction of the effort to force equity, social justice, DEI policies, and sustainability goals onto scientists, writers, editors, and readers globally.

But how does this translate into influencing science into radical and leftist positions?

The Nature.com website enables keyword searches across all Nature journals. When we entered some of the following search terms, the following results were returned.

• 10,510 published papers with the keyword search Sustainability Development Goals

• 1165 published papers with the keyword search transgender

• 90 published papers with the keyword search transgender pediatric

• 47,655 published papers with the keyword search phrase ‘climate change

• 601 published papers with the keyword search “micro aggression”

• 30 published papers with the keyword search “microaggression”

• 795 published papers with the keyword search phrase diversity and inclusion

• 3480 published papers with the keyword search critical race theory

• 5436 published papers with the keyword search DEI

• 444 published with the keyword search gender affirming care

• 1342 published papers with the keyword search “social justice”

Junk science involves scientific claims, studies, or methods that lack validity, reliability, or proper scientific rigor due to faulty data, poor methodology, or deliberate misrepresentation aimed at promoting personal, political, or financial goals. Although it is often presented as credible science, it does not adhere to the established standards of empirical research or the scientific method. Springer Nature is using its science-related publishing house to push its political agenda. This fits the definition of junk science.

The Trump administration claims that Springer Nature publishes junk science. The truth is that the Springer Nature publication standards are of questionable quality, and it’s political goals are driving publications. This is, by definition, junk science. There is truth to this claim.

The Trump administration can not stop Springer Nature from publishing, nor should they. But they can and should stop financially supporting their operations.

It is not a First Amendment issue, as some claim. Stopping payments that support woke science is a fiscal policy grounded in doing what is right for science
(and science workers) in America.