{"id":335252,"date":"2026-05-28T00:56:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-28T00:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/335252\/"},"modified":"2026-05-28T00:56:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-28T00:56:07","slug":"california-senate-passes-uc-sponsored-bill-proposing-12b-research-bond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/335252\/","title":{"rendered":"California Senate passes UC-sponsored bill proposing $12B research bond"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The California Senate voted Wednesday in favor of a bill that would put a $12 billion bond for scientific research on the November 2026 ballot.<\/p>\n<p>Senate Bill 895 \u2013 which state senator Scott Wiener proposed in January and the UC sponsored in March \u2013 will now head to the State Assembly for a vote. The bill would establish the California Foundation for Science and Health Research, which would distribute the $12 billion \u2013 collected through the sale of state bonds \u2013 to research projects.<\/p>\n<p>If the bill passes in the Assembly, it will be sent to Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s desk for approval. If he signs off on the bill, it will be placed on the November ballot.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The bill previously proposed a $23 billion research bond, but it was amended in a May 14 committee hearing to $12 billion.<\/p>\n<p>[Related: <a href=\"https:\/\/dailybruin.com\/2026\/01\/17\/senate-bill-895-seeks-to-establish-23-billion-research-fund-amid-federal-cuts\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Senate Bill 895 seeks to establish $23 billion research fund amid federal cuts<\/a>]<\/p>\n<p>The bill passed the Senate by 29-9 vote. It needed a two-thirds vote to pass the Senate.<\/p>\n<p>Wiener proposed the bill in the wake of the Trump administration\u2019s cuts to research funding at the UC and universities across the country.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The federal government froze $584 million in UCLA\u2019s research grants from the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation and United States Department of Energy in July, alleging that the university allowed antisemitism, affirmative action and \u201cmen to participate in women\u2019s sports.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>A federal judge restored most of the funding through temporary injunctions in August and September and ruled in a different case in November that the Trump administration could not freeze \u2013 or threaten to freeze \u2013 the UC\u2019s federal research funding.<\/p>\n<p>[Related: <a href=\"https:\/\/dailybruin.com\/2025\/07\/31\/federal-government-suspends-research-funding-to-ucla\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Federal government suspends research funding to UCLA<\/a>]<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn the face of MAGA\u2019s senseless destruction of our federal science agencies and cuts to scientific research, California must stand up and defend the research that powers our state,\u201d Wiener said in an emailed statement. \u201cScience is how we heal the sick, feed the hungry, and build the future \u2013 and nowhere does it better than California.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Wiener said he is proud to receive support for the bill from the state Senate, adding that he hopes to build on that momentum in the state Assembly.<\/p>\n<p>UC President James Milliken said in a Sept. 3 letter to Wiener that the federal funding cuts threatened the entire UC system, adding that it receives nearly $6 billion in research funding from the federal government annually.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf passed by voters, the California Science and Health Research Bond Act would help fund modernization of research facilities, expansion of laboratory and clinical capacity, and improvements to public health infrastructure,\u201d Milliken said in a May 4 statement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The California Senate voted Wednesday in favor of a bill that would put a $12 billion bond for&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":335253,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8],"class_list":["post-335252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335252\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/335253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}