This Is a Code Red: How a Quiet OMB Rule Could Gut NIH and Community Funding

This Is a Code Red: How a Quiet OMB Rule Could Gut NIH and Community Funding

From HIT Like a Girl Pod: Empowering Women in Health IT by Like a Girl Media

July 7, 2026 · 33 min

About this episode

Rebecca Love interviews Elizabeth Ginexi, PhD about a proposed OMB rule that threatens federal funding for communities across America.

This episode is a call to action—and we have until July 13th. Rebecca Love sits down with Elizabeth Ginexi, PhD—a former NIH scientific program official of 22 years who took early retirement after DOGE restructured the agency. She is now speaking out about a proposed OMB rule that she believes threatens the future of federal funding across every community in America. The rule rewrites the Uniform Guidance (2 C.F.R. 200), quietly shifting it from "guidance" to "regulation." Elizabeth argues this is designed to bypass Congress's power of the purse—giving political appointees unilateral authority to block, steer, or cancel grants at will. That means $48 billion in NIH funding. Plus Head Start. Plus Title I schools. Plus Meals on Wheels. Plus infrastructure projects. Plus every discretionary grant program that communities rely on. This is not just about science. This is about every community in America. *But there is a 45-day window to oppose it—and it closes July 13th.* Elizabeth walks us through the mechanics of the rule, what is at stake, and—most importantly—exactly what we can do to fight back. She has written easy-to-follow guides and will provide links to submit a comment to…

People in this episode

Host: Rebecca Love

Guest: Elizabeth Ginexi, PhD

Topics covered

Keywords

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: NIH, OMB, Congress, Meals on Wheels, Title I schools, Head Start

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