April 9, 2025
Albany UUP members joined a coalition of Capital Region unions April 8 for a rally on the University at Albany campus as part of an ongoing effort to crank up relentless pressure on Congress about the federal government’s devasting funding freezes and cuts to research.
The message from the event: People affected by the funding freeze and cuts need to continue a sustained push on lawmakers and campus administrations that have been far too cautious in their response to actions by the new administration to slash, cancel or delay research grants.
That power needs to come from the people, as UUP President Fred Kowal told the gathering of more than 100 unionists, faculty and students at an outdoor rally on an absolutely frigid early April afternoon.
“There’s only one thing that’s going to save us from this fascist regime, and that’s us, the people,” Kowal told the crowd, in a reference to the administration of Donald Trump that has handed over unprecedented power to the tech oligarch Elon Musk. Musk, in turn, has taken apart entire federal agencies without any congressional authority or oversight.
“We have to rise up,” Kowal said. “This is about working folks and doing the work we do: the research, the teaching, that make the world better place … as we fight the cuts, we are desperately trying to save our democracy.”
UUP members David Banks, the Albany Chapter Officer for Contingents; J. Andrew Berglund, a SUNY Distinguished Professor and director of UAlbany’s RNA Institute; and NYSUT President Melinda Person also spoke
A march through the campus to Washington Avenue followed the rally; participants picketed at one of the university’s entrances from the street to further amplify their message.
Rallies keep chipping away at the inaction of Congress
The rally was part of Kill The Cuts, a national day of action organized by the higher education advocacy group Labor for Higher Education to raise awareness about the funding cuts ordered by the federal administration. UUP’s national affiliates, the AFT and the NEA, as well as the national advocacy group Higher Education Labor United—of which UUP is a member—were among the organizations that supported the April 8 rallies around the country.
Locally, leaders from a half-dozen unions in addition to UUP participated in the rally, including PEF, SEIU Local 200United, the Capital District Area Labor Federation, the New York State Nurses Association, the American Federation of Government Employees, the Federal Unionists Network and UAlbany’s Graduate Student Employment Union CWA 1104.
Almost immediately after taking office, the new administration ordered a federal funding freeze and a 15% cap on indirect costs payments to colleges and universities that host NIH-funded research. A federal judge temporarily halted the NIH cap Feb. 21. Two federal judges have blocked a freeze on all governmental grants and loans. But say that funding streams have not been uniformly restored, and that many research projects remain stalled.
UUP member Sridar Chittur, a UAlbany research associate professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences, gave a succinct summary as he stood in the rally crowd.
“Work has slowed down … everything is in chaos,” he said.
UAlbany received $63 million in federal research grants in 2023. The university has received nearly $2.6 million in NIH grants in 2025; it got $11 million for nearly 40 NIH projects.