Trump strangles NOAA science as a super El Niño bears down

By Sophie Naimi · Reporting from Paris · October 1, 2026

As a super El Niño threatens coastal communities with flooding, the Trump administration slashes thousands of staff and guts the agency meant to warn us.

The Pacific is boiling while Washington hands out scissors

The planet has warmed by 1.5 degrees Celsius, and the oceans have swallowed the lion's share of that heat. Now, a developing super El Niño in the Pacific Ocean is poised to shatter records. Federal forecasters warn it could be the largest in recorded history. A study in Science notes it is likely the strongest in over a millennium. As Inside Climate News reports, it is so extreme it does not have a scientific name.

Yet when the 2015-16 El Niño struck, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration deployed a full scientific arsenal. They sent out a research ship, planes, weather balloons, and unmanned aircraft. For this historic event, NOAA is deploying four wind-powered watercraft known as Saildrones for a four-month mission. NPR reports that no specific missions are currently planned using research ships or planes.

Why? Because the Trump administration is actively trying to eliminate NOAA's research arm, the Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research. The administration's budget proposal cuts all funding for climate, weather, and ocean laboratories. Officials claim these programs spread "baseless environmental alarm." Meanwhile, under the banner of Trump administration climate denialism, NOAA has lost more than 2,000 staff through firings and retirements. That is roughly 20% of its workforce gone.

This is not fiscal prudence. It is a war on reality. The administration is systematically dismantling scientific infrastructure and purging experts to suppress climate warnings and protect fossil fuel interests. When you blind the watchman, you are not saving money. You are engineering the disaster.

Following the money to corporate rockets while the oceans choke

To understand where our public treasure goes, you only have to follow the federal purse. While NOAA’s laboratories face starvation, defense and aerospace contractors swim in billions. USAspending records show Lockheed Martin Corp received an award of $2,032,829,134.57 from NASA.

We can fund endless corporate space ventures and military hardware. But when the Pacific Ocean turns into a massive heat battery, we are told there is no money for weather balloons. Annarita Mariotti of NOAA's Climate Program Office stated that the agency hopes to use a meager $2 million to $5 million for research, pending a budget from Congress. Congress, meanwhile, limps along on a continuing resolution lasting through December 11.

Daniel Swain, a climate scientist with the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources, calls this a big natural experiment. But he admits he is not super optimistic about anything happening quickly on the federal level. Randy Dole, who helped lead the 2015-16 campaign, reminds us that you have to get observations during the event. You cannot wait until it is over. Marty Ralph of Scripps Institution of Oceanography notes that satellites miss the precision of offshore aircraft data. Michael McPhaden, a senior scientist at the University of Washington, puts it plainly: field data is irreplaceable.

Yet the administration prefers ignorance. The El Niño campaign launched balloons eight times per day and flew 22 research flights. Today, scientists are flying blind into a climate hurricane.

From California floods to Ghana farms, the bill comes due

The physical reality of this Pacific heat discharge will respect no political boundary. Dr. Kenny Blumenfeld of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources notes that daily water temperature records in the Nino 3.4 region broke months ahead of schedule. The ocean and atmosphere are fully coupled.

In California, sea levels have already risen over the past century. This super El Niño will add another foot of sea level rise by December. Coastal flooding risks are extremely high for November and December, particularly in the San Francisco Bay, threatening infrastructure built for a calmer world. In Ghana, as Jeffrey N. A. Aryee of KNUST warns, rain-fed agriculture faces suppressed rainfall, longer dry spells, and extreme heat stress. The Pacific is thousands of kilometers away, but its fury reaches African farms and reservoirs all the same.

This brings us to the core injustice. The global north burns the fossil fuels that load the dice. Then, leaders in Washington slash the budgets meant to measure the catastrophe. They protect the fossil fuel balance sheets while the global south and coastal communities pay in ruined harvests and flooded homes.

We must reject the politicians who defund our survival to feed the polluters' delay. Vote against every candidate who treats planetary physics as a partisan talking point. Fund the science, strip the polluters of their subsidies, and hold the line before the water takes us all.

Trump strangles NOAA science as a super El Niño bears down

The Pacific is boiling while Washington hands out scissors

Following the money to corporate rockets while the oceans choke

From California floods to Ghana farms, the bill comes due

Sources