Those advocating for the protection of “democracy” are simultaneously working to subvert a future presidential administration. Their tool is the “defense of scientific integrity.”

And they are not shy about this. A recent New York Times article declared, “The Resistance to a New Trump Administration Has Already Started,” listing several extraordinary pre-emptive actions taken in plain sight. One effort is the scientific integrity policy.

“Scientific integrity” policies were highlighted in a recent paper by the Council to Modernize Governance. While the origin and need for scientific integrity have roots in good government, it can be abused. Sound and accepted scientific principles like verifying data, transparency on methodology, and replicability risk being cast aside when it conflicts with policy goals. This is what scientific integrity policies have historically addressed.

The Donald Trump administration had policies to promote transparency and reduce conflicts of interest. However, a Biden administration executive order in 2021 cast aside some of these policies, shifting the focus of scientific integrity policies to protecting against “political” interference.

The order proclaimed that “scientific findings should never be distorted or influenced by political considerations.” It banned those policies that have “resulted in improper political interference in the conduct of scientific research.”

But what is “political?” Executive agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency and National Institutes of Health, directing that executive order, imposed changes that seem political. The new regulations prevent “political appointees” — aka the presidentially appointed officers under the Constitution — from participating in the “design, proposal, conduct, management, (or) evaluation” of scientific studies.

For example, if a study is proposed and crafted to understand the effect of the EPA’s controversial electric vehicle mandate, leadership could be considered in violation of the agency’s scientific integrity policies.

These policy changes allow employees to report each other. So, career employees who are told to conduct a study at the president’s behest can report the supervisor simply for the supervisor trying to direct the agency’s work.

Even further, subordinate career employees would be seated at the policymaking table. The policies would enable career employees to control policymaking while lawfully appointed constitutional officers would be effectively neutered. One can understand why administration allies deemed these policies an effort to “Trump-proof” these agencies.

The recent effort to make our government more “equitable” has also penetrated the hard sciences. For instance, the Office of Science and Technology Policy scientific integrity policy now requires that policy be “inclusive of all scientists,” which identifies “diversity, equity and inclusion” language. It also props up “indigenous knowledge” as an example, as well as “Black, Latino… religious minorities, lesbian, gay…(etc.)” persons.

It is hard to understand how “science,” which is supposed to be objective, can be swayed by one’s race or sexuality.

Many of these efforts appear to violate democratic principles and sound decision- making. But instead of tempering these efforts, one agency, the EPA, has written the policy into its collective bargaining agreement with their employees’ union.

These policy changes may violate the Constitution’s appointments clause, which requires anyone with “significant authority” in government to be appointed by the president. By “shielding career researchers and contractors,” as reported by Politico, from appropriate supervision, career employees are given that “significant authority” without a presidential appointment.

News outlets may have inadvertently said the quiet part out loud. All Americans should be aware of this effort to subvert our constitutionally created democratic framework under the auspice of protecting democracy and science.

Curtis Schube is the executive director of the Council to Modernize Governance.