How the CCP Infiltrates the US Through Academia

After the Biden administration took office in 2021, it lifted President Trump’s ban on WeChat, among other things, and canceled the ‘China Initiative.’

Graduating students wearing masks attend a commencement ceremony at Chongqing University of Posts and Telecommunications in Chongqing, China, on June 22, 2022. Cnsphoto via Reuters

Chinese students being denied entry at U.S. airports, despite holding valid visas, has been a frequent occurrence in recent years. Students have been denied entry by customs enforcement officers while returning to the United States after vacationing in China, traveling to a third country, attending conferences, or, in the case of new students, coming to the country to study.

On Jan. 28, 2020, FBI agents stormed into Harvard University’s Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology and handcuffed department head Dr. Charles Lieber. At 60, Dr. Lieber is a world-renowned nanoscientist and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He is also a foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Mr. Lieber was accused of being a member of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) “Thousand Talents Plan,” receiving a monthly salary of $50,000 from Wuhan University of Technology (WUT), a personal income of $158,000, and $1.74 million to establish a research lab at WUT. Authorities say Mr. Lieber lied to federal authorities about his involvement in the “Thousand Talents Plan” and his affiliation with WUT.

On the afternoon of Mr. Lieber’s arrest, the U.S. Department of Justice announced three cases, including Dr. Lieber’s, which immediately made headlines.

Dr. Lieber’s case has been one of the most high-profile arrests since the Department of Justice’s “China Initiative” was launched in 2018 to counter the CCP. The other two cases involving Chinese researchers also attracted attention.

One is Zheng Zaosong, who was conducting cancer cell research at a medical center in Boston, Massachusetts. On Dec. 10, 2019, she was arrested at Logan International Airport for allegedly attempting to steal vials of biological samples from a laboratory to bring back to China.

Another is 29-year-old Ye Yanqing. On Jan. 28, 2020, a federal arrest warrant was issued for her in the Massachusetts area.

Who Is Ye Yanqing?

In August 2017, Ye applied online for a J-1 scholar exchange visa. More than a month later, she joined the Department of Physics, Chemistry, and Biomedical Engineering at Boston University.

On the J-1 application form, Ye listed her identity as a “student” and stated that she had never joined any army. However, she graduated from the National University of Defense Technology (NUDT), which is the highest military academy of the CCP and the only directly affiliated university of the Central Military Commission.

NUDT was sanctioned by the United States in February 2015. However, Ye successfully obtained a U.S. visa.

During Ye’s time in the United States on her J-1 visa, she maintained close contact with her supervisors at NUDT and other colleagues, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ).

In April 2019, Ye concluded her one-and-a-half-year stint as an international student, which she spent in “study and research,” and arrived at Logan International Airport to return to China. She was stopped and questioned by federal officers, and her electronic devices, such as computers and phones, were seized for inspection.

“During the interview, it is alleged that Ye falsely claimed that she had minimal contact with two NUDT professors who were high-ranking PLA officers. However, a search of Ye’s electronic devices demonstrated that at the direction of one NUDT professor, who was a PLA colonel, Ye had accessed U.S. military websites, researched U.S. military projects, and compiled information for the PLA on two U.S. scientists with expertise in robotics and computer science,” a DOJ statement reads.

“Furthermore, a review of a WeChat conversation revealed that Ye and the other PLA official from NUDT were collaborating on a research paper about a risk assessment model designed to decipher data for military applications. During the interview, Ye admitted that she held the rank of lieutenant in the PLA and admitted she was a member of the CCP.”

A federal arrest warrant was issued for Ye in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts in Boston, on Jan. 28, 2020. FBI

On Jan. 28, 2020, Ye was indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice on charges of visa fraud, making false statements, acting as an agent of a foreign government, and conspiracy. She is currently living in China, according to the Jan. 28 DOJ statement.

US Crackdown on ‘Thousand Talents Plan’ Cases

The “Thousand Talents Plan,” a program launched by the CCP in 2008, aims to recruit overseas talent to promote China’s national strategies and is managed by the CCP’s Organization Department. The plan attracts top overseas talent, including professors from prestigious universities and scholars from research institutions, to establish projects in China. It offers high salaries and significant project investments, facilitating the transfer of sensitive or proprietary information from the United States to China. The program does not require individuals to resign from their current positions or relocate permanently to China.

Within ten years, the plan had recruited more than 6,000 professionals, helping China’s technology, economy, and other fields to improve significantly. At this time, the CCP began to issue statements about defeating the United States. Many scholars of the “Thousand Talents Plan” had also become positive propaganda tools for Beijing, with their topics becoming part of the regime’s foreign propaganda.

In 2018, the Trump administration initiated investigations into American professors and scientists involved with the “Thousand Talents Plan,” who were connected with obscure research institutes in China. In November of that year, the “China Initiative” was launched to identify and prosecute individuals and groups suspected of engaging in commercial and economic espionage. The initiative has since become a significant tool for the FBI when investigating non-traditional economic espionage activities.

In this undated photo, Chinese pro-democracy groups gather outside the FBI building in Los Angeles to call on the U.S. government to bring communist spies to justice. Xu Xiuhui/The Epoch Times

On Dec. 1, 2018, Huawei’s chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, was arrested by Canadian police at Vancouver Airport during a transfer. She was wanted by the United States for fraud. At 6 p.m. that evening, Zhang Shousheng, a leading Chinese-American scientist in Silicon Valley and a lifelong professor at Stanford University with highly promising Nobel Prize prospects, committed suicide by jumping off a building.

Some of the technologies he researched reportedly helped make breakthroughs in Huawei’s 5G technology. Zhang’s venture capital firm, Danhua Capital, was investigated by the FBI before his death. In late 2018, the United States Trade Representative released an updated version of the “Special 301 Report,” accusing venture capital firms, including Danhua Capital, of assisting CCP authorities in obtaining U.S. cutting-edge technology.

According to Cheng Ganyuan, a Chinese legal scholar in the United States and fellow alumnus of Zhang from Fudan University, the physics department at Fudan University in Shanghai, where Zhang completed his early studies, served as a training ground for the CCP to dispatch technology spies overseas. Danhua Capital was not a personal asset of Zhang’s; rather, it was provided by the CCP as a means for him to transfer technological intelligence abroad.

The incidents involving Meng Wanzhou and Zhang Shouzheng sparked ongoing Western scrutiny of the “Thousand Talents Plan” and economic espionage. Chinese students studying abroad have been caught up in this scrutiny due to concerns over spy infiltration.

US Response

In order to prevent U.S. technology from being used by the Chinese military, the United States imposed strict restrictions on Chinese F-1 student visas and J-1 scholar visas. In May 2020, then-President Trump signed Proclamation 10043, suspending and restricting the entry of Chinese postgraduate students, studying or working at institutions related to the CCP’s “military-civil fusion strategy,” into the United States.

The United States has added companies and schools related to the “military-civil fusion strategy” to the Entity List for export control. This prohibits them from using products containing U.S. technology and from purchasing components from the United States without government approval.

In May and December 2020, the Bureau of Industry and Security updated the Entity List, adding a total of 110 Chinese companies and institutions, including 7 universities. By then, 18 Chinese universities had been added to the list.

Since the implementation of Proclamation 10043 in June 2020, students from these universities have been unable to apply to study, pursue postgraduate or doctoral degrees, or conduct research in the United States. This means China will find it difficult to obtain the latest research in fields such as aerospace, communications, computers, AI, biological sciences, and industrial engineering from the United States.

From June to September 2020, the visas of more than 1,000 Chinese students were canceled. In June 2021, an investigation into 310 students who had been denied visas revealed that most of them had either studied at the “Seven Sons of National Defense,” the Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications or had received funding from the China Scholarship Council.

Outside of the United States, Microsoft Research Asia has stopped recruiting students from the “Seven Sons of National Defense” and Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications. Students from Harbin Institute of Technology and Harbin Engineering University can no longer use MATLAB, the world’s most mainstream statistical programming language tool.

One student from Beihang University who shopped on Amazon and filled in the university’s address as the shipping address found the account suspended. Amazon’s official response was that this complied with sanctions and export control regulations.

After the Biden administration took office in 2021, it lifted President Trump’s ban on WeChat, among other things, and canceled the “China Initiative.” Beijing hoped that Proclamation 10043 would also be repealed. However, contrary to the regime’s wishes, the Biden administration did not repeal the order, and the lawsuit filed by Chinese students against Proclamation 10043 was dismissed in June 2023.

Chinese students studying abroad generally feel that U.S. immigration checks are getting stricter and students from “sensitive universities” continue to be banned from entering the country.

On Jan. 4, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin reiterated the CCP’s rhetoric, accusing the United States of being discriminatory, and “politicizing and weaponizing academic research.”

The CCP regime has demanded that the United States repeal Proclamation 10043.

In 2023, the United States banned the use of TikTok on federal systems. Following this, public universities in states such as Florida and Texas banned Chinese apps including TikTok, Alipay, WeChat, QQ Wallet, and Tencent from being used on campus.

Florida has also implemented two bans that set it apart from other states: one prohibits public universities from recruiting Chinese students into academic laboratories, and the other prohibits Chinese nationals from purchasing land and houses in Florida.