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European universities have begun recruiting researchers who lost their jobs in the administration’s cost-cutting efforts, or are anxious over perceived threats to academic freedom.
- March 25, 2025Updated 8:00 a.m. ET
Just hours after opening its new program for American researchers called Safe Place For Science in reaction to Trump administration policies, Aix Marseille University received its first application.
Since then, the university in the south of France known for its science programs, has received about a dozen applications per day from what the school considers “scientific asylum” seekers.
Other universities in France and elsewhere in Europe have also rushed to save American researchers fleeing drastic cuts to jobs and programs by the Trump administration, as well as perceived attacks on whole fields of research.
At stake are not just individual jobs, but the concept of free scientific inquiry, university presidents say. They are also rushing to fill huge holes in collective research caused by the cuts, particularly in areas targeted by the Trump administration, including studies of climate change, public health, environmental science, gender and diversity.
If the movement becomes a trend, it could mean the reversal of the long-term brain drain that has seen generations of scientists move to the United States. And while at least some Europeans have noted that the changes in the United States provide a unique opportunity to build stronger European research centers, most academics say that competition is not the short-term motivation.
“This program is ultimately linked to indignation, to declare what is happening in the United States is not normal,” said Éric Berton, president of Aix Marseille University, which has earmarked 15 million euros (nearly $16,300,000) for 15 three-year positions.
