$2.5 Million: NIH Studied How Structural Racism Affects the Health of Older Black Gay Men. DOGE Terminated It.

§ 01 / The Study

The NIH National Institute on Aging funded research into the intersection of structural racism, social stress, and health outcomes among older Black gay and bisexual men. The study examined how cumulative exposure to racism and sexual minority stress affects aging trajectories — specifically cardiovascular health, cognitive decline, and HIV-related outcomes — in a population with documented health disparities on multiple dimensions simultaneously. Published gerontology research documents that older LGBTQ+ adults have significantly worse health outcomes than their heterosexual peers across multiple measures, including higher rates of depression, social isolation, and delayed preventive care.

This grant sits at the intersection of two categories the Trump administration targeted: “structural racism” research (targeted by EO 14173 ending DEI programs) and LGBTQ+ health research (targeted by EO 14168 ending transgender ideology programs). The grant was terminated under the NIH notice applying both executive orders to the research portfolio. The study’s principal investigators argued the research was basic gerontology examining social determinants of health — a long-established NIH research priority — not ideology.

The Framing Problem

“Structural racism” is a term that has both an ideological usage (as a political claim about systemic oppression) and a scientific usage (as a variable in health disparities research describing documented differences in healthcare access, environmental exposure, and treatment by race). NIH health disparities research uses the term in the scientific sense. DOGE terminated grants containing it in either sense under EO 14173. The result was the termination of health outcomes research that used the term scientifically, because the term itself had become politically toxic regardless of context.

§ 02 / What This Means

What This Means

$2.5 million in NIH funding for aging research examining how cumulative racism and sexual minority stress affects the health of older Black gay men — a population with documented health disparities. Terminated under both EO 14168 and EO 14173. The research community argues it was basic social determinants of health research; the Trump administration’s position is that any grant referencing “structural racism” or LGBTQ+ populations represents politicized DEI ideology rather than science.

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