Two former US science advisers have warned against restrictions on scientists’ freedom to speak out on contentious issues like climate change, which they say could result in laws being made on the basis of false evidence.

John Holdren, who was science adviser to Barack Obama until last month, said that Donald Trump’s team already appeared to be taking “a more comprehensive, more draconian and more oppressive” approach to vetting scientists’ communications than previous administrations. According to Holdren, a series of memos and public statements by administration officials has amounted to a clear message: “Nobody talks to anybody without permission from the team at the White House.”

Neal Lane, who was acting science adviser during the Clinton administration, said that if early indications of a clampdown on federal agency communications are indicative of a long-term strategy, the public could be misled about evidence on politically sensitive issues.

“It looks like this administration plans to control everything that goes out,” said Lane, who is now senior fellow in science and technology policy at Rice University in Houston. “I’d be fearful that we’ll get wrong statements about science, false information about science.”

The comments came ahead of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in Boston, where leading scientists will hold a series of meetings looking at how to respond to the Trump administration’s policies on climate change, communication and immigration restrictions.

Speaking to the press on Thursday morning, the AAAS CEO, Rush Holt, said: “When officials use a phrase like ‘alternative facts’ without embarrassment, you know there’s a problem.

“Ideological assertions have been crowding out evidence in public and private debates and in policymaking,” Holt added. “It’s reaching the point where people are truly troubled by what this means for the practice of science.”

Also addressing the conference, Barbara Schaal, the AAAS president, said: “This kind of situation where evidence is discarded, where it’s modified, where it’s morphed, is very disconcerting. If we’re going to have a conversation about the role of lead or arsenic in drinking water, we need to know the facts about how many parts per million have what health consequences.”

A number of attempts to suppress federal science communications have been reported since Trump took office, but questions remain over whether these stem from an overarching White House strategy or simply run-of-the-mill move to limit public statements until new federal agency chiefs are in post.

Last month, it was reported that scientists at the Department for Agriculture had been banned by the division’s chief of staff from publicly sharing photos, fact sheets, tweets or summaries of their research, but the order was quickly rescinded. Similarly, the Environmental Protection Agency’s climate change pages remain intact, despite reports that the Trump administration had ordered the EPA to purge any mention of the issue from its website – although mentions of climate policy have been removed from White House pages.

Holdren argues that the series of restrictions being placed on federal agency scientists has gone beyond what is normal for a transition and notes that there has been no attempt by the White House to dispel rumours of a clampdown.



Holdren also expressed concern about the proposed revival of the so-called Secret Science bill, which he said could stifle freedom of speech and the regulatory powers.

“The bill is really an attempt to squelch … and intimidate climate scientists,” he said. “It is a transparent attempt to reduce the effectiveness of the government science enterprise in domains that are politically controversial.”

Lane said that it was likely that any chilling effects of new legislation would be felt most in politically sensitive areas, such as climate change.

“Scientists just have to stay above the fray here and when scientists are literally under attack and being demonised, the community has to embrace them and defend them – maybe even with money if they have to defend themselves in court,” he said. “It’s been ugly and could get uglier.”

Fears about new controls over the communication of climate data have already triggered a wave of activism, including the emergence of “shadow” federal agency datasets and social media accounts online.

Last weekend, coders held a hackathon at the University of California, Berkeley to archive federal climate data outside of government servers and a series of non-official Twitter accounts, such as @roguenasa, have sprung up.

Keith Cowing, a Nasa scientist turned journalist who runs the insider website Nasa Watch, said that the “rogue” movement’s main achievement so far appeared to be causing a stir in the media.



“All these so-called rogue Twitter accounts don’t do anything,” he said. “They just talk about each other, there’s an immense about of noise.”

However, he predicted the movement could play a more powerful role in the event of a clampdown on the communication of scientific research. “What will happen if Nasa or Noaa is ordered to take down a database to prevent its dissemination, it will cause it to appear on multiple websites around the world immediately,” he said. “If they attempt to make this go away, it will be like throwing a rock into a puddle of mud.”

While the data might survive, the public could be left confused about where to seek out reliable information. “On one hand it’s hooray for truth, on the other hand … how can you believe it? It’s not the official government website.”



