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May 08, 2025

# Bill Nye

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## Video: TIME100 Health | The Honorees

[Watch (HLS stream): TIME100 Health | The Honorees](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/E3ji9BFs.m3u8) (0:40)

![TIME100 Health | The Honorees](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/E3ji9BFs/poster.jpg?width=720)

_Published 2025-05-08_

Scientific evangelist

by 

[Jeffrey Kluger](/author/jeffrey-kluger/)


## Jeffrey Kluger


Editor at Large

![](https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8cb6eec96db1ec11/6998c64c07a30d45ae77cf9c/Bill-Nye-copy.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=3:2)

Jamie McCarthy—Getty Images

Bill Nye did not have much to do with politics during the 1990s, when he was making his celebrated [_Bill Nye the Science Guy_](https://tv.apple.com/us/show/bill-nye-the-science-guy/umc.cmc.5ychcma6xrmfymjdjunm5hutw "undefined") TV series on PBS. But Nye has grown increasingly vocal in his objections to changes, budget cuts, and firings at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the National Institutes of Health, NASA, and elsewhere under the Trump Administration. Now he’s using his millennial celebrity to speak out. 

“If the U.S. is to lead the world, science cannot be suppressed,” he said at the [Stand Up For Science](https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/politics/2025/03/07/stand-up-for-science-rally-bill-nye "undefined") rally in Washington, D.C., in March, where he urged people to make their feelings known to lawmakers. In addition to inspiring action, Nye has attracted the ire of the Administration’s supporters, including Elon Musk, who criticized him on X. But Nye is not inclined to go quietly. “Scientists are citizens, and science has always been political,” he tells TIME. “Where do you apply your intellect and treasure? How do you make decisions on how to spend government resources? What do you require of private industry, of vaccine labs? You need informed policy makers, and they're going to get that information from scientists and engineers.”

Nye has also leveraged his celebrity to grow awareness of ataxia, a neurological disorder that causes motor issues and has affected members of his family for generations. In 2024, he [partnered](https://www.ataxia.org/billnye/ "undefined") with the National Ataxia Foundation to help educate the public about the rare genetic disease.


TIME100 Health: Bill Nye

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