The letters, sent by Musk staffers, come amid his push to cut up to 80 percent of the agency’s roughly 180-person staff. Let’s be clear: these grants were already awarded and are funded through bipartisan congressional appropriations. Terminating them is illegal.

Shifting these functions to private hands jeopardizes data transparency, public safety, and the equitable distribution of knowledge that has historically been free and publicly available.

We are calling for an immediate congressional investigation into this matter.

The privatization of NOAA’s core responsibilities—such as weather forecasting, climate research, and environmental monitoring—poses serious risks to the quality, accessibility, and impartiality of the information we all rely on.