How much of a setback would this really be, though? The US government spent $200 billion of R&D in 2024. Of that $200 billion, $140 billion of it was military related which is probably not in danger. Including private spending, total r&d was around $900 billion. So even if the $60 billion of non-military government research spending was entirely eliminated, that would be only around a 7% decline in spending.
But still that would be bad. That $60 billion is a lot to replace from private funding. I don't know if it would be a net negative, though. It seems like privately funded research can seriously outperform government funding because when private actors fund research, they do it for the specific reason that they want the research done. Contrast this with public funding which has to meet a lot of political goals that have nothing to do with science. Look what SpaceX has been able to accomplish vs NASA. NASA has great scientists and engineers and a much bigger budget than SpaceX did, but the problem is that their rocket building program was more of a jobs program and a way to spread money to a lot of congressional districts than it was about building rockets. Whereas SpaceX had exactly one goal and that was to build rockets.
I also think that it's important to fund research in a regular manner, but is government a more reliable way than private patrons? It feels like its the opposite. If we had a government that really cared about science and committed to funding it in an effective way and never using it as a cover to funnel money to political causes I do think it would be better than relying on private funding, but when I read a list of cancelled grant like this it doesn't seem like we do. https://airtable.com/appGKlSVeXniQZkFC/shrFxbl1YTqb3AyOO?jnt...