I receive emails from those with whom I mostly disagree with on almost everything and The Conversation is one of those. In my email box this morning I received this from The Conversation. “Amid the whirlwind of Donald Trump’s first few days as US president, it might have been easy to miss his ban on federal funding for so-called “woke” research. We’ve just had a stark reminder.

Researchers from at least eight Australian universities who work on US-funded projects have been sent a 36-point questionnaire about how their work fits with US domestic and foreign policy.

Questions include “can you confirm this is not a climate or ‘environmental justice’ project or include such elements?”, and “can you confirm that this is no DEI [diversity, equity and inclusion] project?” [sic] Other survey topics include the Mexican border, links with China, “gender ideology” and “eradicating anti-Christian bias”.

Unsurprisingly, Australian universities and academics have reacted with horror and dismay. It’s not certain what will happen next, but what’s clear already is that Australia will need to look beyond the US for research collaborations.

As law researcher Brendan Walker-Munro writes, “It is arguable Trump’s orders infringe Australian sovereignty. But the US has always had the capacity to interfere in Australian university research – it just hasn’t actually done it until now.”’

Why the US government would be giving money to foreign universities is a question that I am sure I would never understand the answer to even if one could be given. The Universities in Australia are a woke and Left leaning as those in the USA.

Anyway, I am glad President Trump had Elon looking into this and hopefully this funding may cease. Here is the link to The Conversation’s entire article.

https://theconversation.com/trump-is-surveying-australian-academics-about-gender-diversity-and-china-what-does-this-mean-for-unis-and-their-research-252282?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20March%2018%202025%20-%203300633704&utm_content=Latest%2