When President Donald Trump took office in January, he promised to fundamentally reshape higher education by cutting research funding, restricting international students, ending diversity, equity and inclusion programs, and taking other actions that higher education leaders scrambled to handle.
Behind the scenes, university government relations, along with private lobbying firms, visited lawmakers to plead their cases. The University of Michigan spent nearly $1.2 million on lobbying this year, more than three times what it spent in total in 2024, public lobbying disclosures show. UM is the largest research university in Michigan, with research spending that totaled $2.04 billion in 2024.
The cuts have affected the state’s three largest research institutions in UM, Michigan State University and Wayne State University the most.
This wasn’t entirely surprising, said Jesse Crosson, an associate professor of political science at Purdue University who studies legislative politics and money in politics, partly focused on how partisan competition has influenced the way interest groups operate. Not only was the university advocating for itself as it always had, but it was pushing back against a Republican White House that was deeply skeptical of higher education’s mission.
“You have to imagine (UM and other universities) are pretty nervous,” Crosson said. “I would say there’s something to the fact they’ve increased their spending.”
Michigan State University has also increased spending on lobbyists this year to $370,000, 15% more than at this time last year.
The job hasn’t changed much amid the change in leadership and money spent, said Rebecca DeVooght, Michigan State University vice president of government relations. It has required her team to move faster, however.
“The pace of federal action has required deeper coordination across campus and a more proactive engagement in Washington,” DeVooght said.
The way universities use their time with lawmakers has also changed slightly, DeVooght said. She said she’s found that policymakers are more receptive to specific real-world examples of MSU’s impact, something Michigan Association of State Universities CEO Dan Hurley said he encourages advocates for the universities to do.
“No matter how positive facts and figures are, it’s often the individual stories of students and graduates that have the most positive impact on legislators,” Hurley said.
How coalition saved $5M for MSU
The Nos. 1, 2 and 3 things on the minds of lawmakers are whether they’ll have a job in the next few years, Crosson said. Anything that can help them secure reelection is something they’ll take seriously, and universities should target that, he said.
Ezemenari Obasi, Wayne State University’s vice president of research, has visited Washington, D.C., alongside Relations Officer Melissa Smiley and the university’s hired lobbying firm, Lewis-Burke Associates. He said he’s found members of Congress are more receptive to stories about how the university has affected people.
“What we found to be most effective is less about dollar amounts, but more around: How would the city of Detroit be impacted if these programs were ended?” Obasi said. “And so we spent a lot of time using case statements to show the value of higher education and the value that the research done has on our local communities.”
In conversations with lawmakers, he said he’s pointed to research and work done by Wayne State’s Karmanos Cancer Institute as an example of the real-world impact.
“We talk about how 60% of cancer patients (in Michigan) will have a touchpoint with Karmanos,” Obasi said. “And so, if you begin to remove funding like that, we have a hard time dealing with prevention and various treatment modalities that are actually saving lives. And I think that story is impactful, because most people can relate with someone who’s experienced cancer.”
These one-on-one conversations with lawmakers are crucial, he said.
“I think oftentimes it’s easy for us to paint our lawmakers with a brush, based on what we see in the media,” Obasi said. “And what I have found is that having these one-on-one conversations are really an excellent opportunity to work through any kind of misunderstandings.”
DeVooght said the conversations have a real impact. She pointed to earlier this year, when it wasn’t clear if the Flint Lead Exposure Registry would be funded for the 2026 fiscal year because the funding was held up due to layoffs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A bipartisan coalition of 12 Michigan lawmakers and four others signed a letter calling for the registry, which is administered by MSU, to be fully funded.
“It was all hands on deck,” DeVooght said. “(Rep.) Lisa McClain (R-Bruce Township), Tom Barrett, everyone in the state was saying, ‘This is our priority.’”
Through the work of MSU and the bipartisan coalition of lawmakers, the Flint Registry was approved in August for nearly $5 million through 2026.
U.S. Rep. Tom Barrett, R-Charlotte, who represents MSU, has always had “a positive and productive working relationship” with MSU, Barrett spokesman Jeremiah Ward said in an email.
“That relationship recently led to the congressman securing $3 million for MSU to support the innovative agricultural research happening on campus,” Ward said. “We look forward to keeping lines of communication open as we work together to deliver results for the university and the greater mid-Michigan community.”
U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Ann Arbor, said her relationship with UM has fluctuated over the last decade. She said she feels her role is to consider all aspects of the university as a major constituent — both the things she likes that it’s doing and the things she doesn’t.
“My job is to understand their perspectives on issues that impact them, the students, the faculty, the athletes,” Dingell said.
U.S. Rep. Shri Thanedar, a Detroit Democrat who represents Wayne State in his district, said the Detroit urban university has been “a model for higher education everywhere.”
“I am proud to represent the school in Congress, and have an open door policy with them, for anything they need,” Thanedar said in a statement. “Achieving fully funded college for all students is a goal of mine, and making sure to secure as much federal funding as possible for Wayne State is a top priority for me.”
Rising costs of lobbying
The costs of lobbying are rising. In UM’s case, the amount of representation is too.
In 2023 and 2024, Michigan State spent the same amount of money on in-house government relations: $340,000. In 2025, MSU has reached $310,000.
In 2023, UM spent $300,000 on in-house government relations and $260,000 in 2024. This year, it has spent $520,000.
UM officials did not respond to questions from The Detroit News, but disclosures show Michigan has retained the Alston and Bird Law Firm and, in 2024, brought on Strategic Marketing Innovations. This year, the university hired Ballard Partners and BGR Group as additional lobbying groups.
Michigan State University retains Bose Public Affairs Group as a partner, specifically to lobby for “issues related to funding for the Department of Energy’s nuclear physics program,” disclosures show. This is primarily used to get contracts or grants for the campus’ Facility for Rare Isotope Beams, spokesperson Amber McCann said.
MSU hasn’t spent considerably more on outside lobbying compared with the last two years, a consistent rate of $20,000 every quarter and $80,000 annually. UM spent $25,000 on outside representation in 2023 and $95,000 in 2024. This year, UM officials have spent $660,000.
Wayne State only retains outside counsel. Like MSU, Wayne State is on pace with 2024 spending at $50,000 a quarter or $200,000 for the year.
Crosson said the practice of retaining both in-house and outside, multi-client lobbyists isn’t unusual. The number of organizations with “hired gun” lobbyists acting on their behalf is the highest it’s been since at least the mid-1990s, he said.
These organizations hire lobbyists for two things, Crosson said: their specialized expertise on a topic, such as nuclear energy programs, and their ability to get access to a lawmaker.
“The advantage (of an in-house lobbyist) is you can look out for MSU’s or UM’s interests, and their interests alone,” Crosson said. “They only have one client to care about. On the other hand, you may hire a contractor because they specialize in something. Maybe they’ve spent their career inside the Department of Energy and know what they’re looking for in a grant application, or what they’re looking for in a contract like the back of their hand. So they’re more specialized than you can ever hope to be.”
As Congress has become less autonomous and more decisions are made by party leadership behind closed doors, it’s even more important to know who can get a university official in the room with a lawmaker, he said.
University networks
Universities don’t always need to rely on firms or government relations executives to get their points heard by lawmakers. Institutions can lean on their alumni, especially those who hold seats in Congress or roles in legislative offices, to help get their message heard. Former longtime U.S. Rep. Fred Upton, R-St. Joseph, was a UM graduate.
“Lobbyists do have the impression that sharing an alma mater can improve access, either with an individual staffer or with the legislator themselves,” Crosson said. “There’s 20,000 lobbyists in Washington and only 535 legislator offices. Competition for access is pretty steep, and you’re looking for any sort of advantage you can find to make a connection with that office.”
But the real influence of universities is hard to quantify through just the information on lobbying disclosures, Crosson said. Prominent alumni often are influential with lawmakers, particularly the ones to whom they’ve donated, and universities sometimes tap into these informal relationships to advocate their causes, he said.
“Asking a prominent alum who happens to be a big-time businessperson or a big-time media influencer or whatever, who lives in the district of a member of Congress to talk to them on (the university’s) behalf, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that,” Crosson said. “And (the alum) would not need to register to do that because it’s just an American exercising their First Amendment right to petition one’s government.”
Michigan State has started tapping into its student and parent base, along with alumni and faculty, for its “Spartan Advocate” initiative.
“We’re trying to mobilize thousands of Spartans; students, alumni, and now we’ve expanded it to employees and faculty to help tell the story better in D.C., in Lansing and across the state,” DeVooght said. “I think this is a modernized advocacy network that’s really grassroots-based and allows us to speak with a more unified voice.”
What universities are asking for
Although the job of a university government relations team hasn’t changed, the focus of the conversations has, Wayne State’s Obasi said.
“Last year, we were much more future-oriented,” he said. “We’d talk about how we can collaborate around shared interests and so forth. Whereas this year, we were in a more defensive posture around how we protect our interests.”
Wayne State’s disclosures show something similar. Along with what they’ve lobbied for in the past, the disclosures show the Detroit-based university lobbying specifically about “issues related to grant funding” and, before it was passed, lobbying on “issues pertaining to higher education policies, student aid, and taxes” that were part of the One Big Beautiful Bill signed by Trump on July 4.
Like Wayne State, Michigan State and Michigan both lobbied specifically on grant cancellations this year, something they haven’t had to do in the past two years, according to disclosures.
DeVooght and Obasi agreed that their relationships with lawmakers were one of the most important parts of their jobs and said they had good relationships, despite more scrutiny about higher education from Trump officials and Congress.
“Our delegation is exceedingly available, and they are beyond available to Michigan State,” DeVooght said. “We are lucky that we have individuals that are willing to pick up the phone, are willing to text.
“They’re busy people, and we’re busy people,” DeVooght continued. “But there’s not a time that we don’t have access to all of them.”
satwood@detroitnews.com
