California voters in 2028 could decide whether to establish a $7.5-billion state scientific research arm — similar to the National Institutes of Health — to backfill threatened funding cuts by the Trump administration that could affect groundbreaking research at the University of California and elsewhere in the state.
The new state fund would blunt potential federal research funding cuts that “threaten to bulldoze the nation’s top scientific institutions, disrupting innovations critical to California’s future,” according to the office of state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who wrote the legislation to put the proposal before voters.
UC said at least $1 billion in federal research dollars is currently endangered by cuts.
The Legislature on Monday approved and sent to Gov. Gavin Newsom a March 2028 ballot measure that would authorize bonds to create the California Foundation for Science and Health Research.
If signed by Newsom and passed by voters, the $7.5 billion in bonds would fund California scientific and medical research into diseases such as cancer, Parkinson’s and ALS, as well as on ways to reduce wildfire risk and fight pandemics and climate change.
The legislation was sponsored by the Union of American Physicians and the University of California. United Auto Workers Local 4811, which represents some 60,000 UC academic workers, also sponsored the plan.
“The federal government may retreat from its responsibilities, but our state will not retreat with it,” UAW 4811 president Rafael Jaime said during a recent news conference. “This is a meaningful step toward the investment working families need — investment that delivers the education and research that drives our economy and helps train the next generation.”
The legislation, Senate Bill 895, marks a pullback from what was first proposed.
Originally conceived as a $23-billion bond measure that the Legislature would approve to go before voters in November, it was whittled down to $12 billion. Lawmakers then failed to approve it in time for the November ballot and SB 895 was considered dead, according to Wiener.
But on Friday, Wiener announced an agreement between legislative leaders and the governor’s office to amend SB 895 to $7.5 billion and target the March 2028 election.
The money, while less than the original amount, is an increase from the $5 billion a key Assembly committee wanted.
In addition to UC, research dollars would flow to the California State University system and private institutions.
The measure also calls for the new state fund to establish regulations that would allow it to recoup part of its investments, while not damaging innovation.
“California’s strength and ingenuity depends on its ability to turn bold ideas into solutions to our most pressing problems,” Randy Schekman, a Nobel laureate and UC Berkeley professor, said in a statement released by the UC.
“SB 895 will help protect the people and discoveries that drive billions of dollars in economic activity and improve lives across our state.”
The amended version passed the Assembly on Monday by 60-to-6 and the Senate approved it 28-to-9.
The governor’s office has not said whether Newsom will sign the legislation, but Wiener said Newsom’s office was involved in coming up with changes.
Wiener said there were concerns about putting an additional bond measure on the crowded November 2026 ballot and called the original $23 billion an aspiration number that “we always knew … was going to come down significantly if we were going to be successful.”
In 2025, the Trump administration moved to cut or freeze more than $3 billion in previously approved research grants nationwide and asked Congress to slash scientific research by another $44 billion, according to a May report from the Brennan Center for Justice.
Many of those cuts were prevented through litigation and Congress’ refusal to act, the report said. But the Trump administration is again proposing to cut billions in research for the upcoming fiscal year.
“We know for science to succeed we need predictability and stability, not month-by-month funding fights,” Wiener said Friday in announcing the deal to resurrect SB 895.
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