Summary

• Researchers at federal agencies and universities report substituting climate terms with broader language such as weather extremes, elevated temperatures, and soil health.
• Grant review and funding decisions appear to penalize projects labeled too explicitly as climate research, especially in federal settings.
• The adjustment is not limited to one institution; similar framing shifts are reported across USDA-linked research, universities, and state climatology work.
• Coastal resilience, weather variability, and infrastructure resilience are being used as safer labels for climate-relevant research topics.
• Funding uncertainty is pushing some researchers toward private or international support to preserve climate communication and related work.
• The main tension is between keeping research visible and complying with changing political or administrative expectations.