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Following the Department of Justice’s indictment of two Chinese individuals, one of whom is a research fellow at the University of Michigan, for allegedly bringing a possible “agroterrorism” weapon into the United States, national security specialists have urged the Trump administration to persist in efforts to stop American universities and businesses from “essentially educating and empowering our main global rival,” Fox News Digital reported.
“In certain instances, it appears we haven’t learned from the COVID-19 pandemic,” stated Christian Whiton, who served as a senior foreign policy advisor during the Bush and Trump administrations, in an interview with Fox News Digital. “We’re currently allowing direct flights from China to the U.S. mainland, which is quite risky. It’s astonishing that researchers, especially those working with pathogens, are permitted entry anywhere in the U.S., let alone at universities. This seems reminiscent of a pre-COVID outlook.”
On Tuesday, the two Chinese nationals faced charges of illegally transporting the Fusarium graminearum fungus, an aggressive biological pathogen recognized as a “known agroterrorism agent,” through the Detroit airport. Each year, this harmful substance leads to billions of dollars in economic damage globally by causing “head blight” in crops like wheat, barley, maize, and rice, as stated by federal prosecutors. In both humans and animals, contact with the toxins can result in symptoms like vomiting, liver damage, and reproductive issues.
“It’s a new take on Chinese espionage and sabotage of the US economy. But it’s not a surprise. I think that China has failed to pull back on any of its aggressive activity. And this is something that the Trump administration probably wants to take into consideration,” Whiton said of the case. “I think it’s both the government and our universities have let down the American people.”
“That’s a step in the right direction,” Whiton said. “But in reality, we probably need to recognize these are our chief economic and security adversary in the world and take those visa numbers down closer to zero and start sending these people home.”
Whiton said there is a “faulty assumption” that Chinese students would come to the United States, learn about American culture and bring an appreciation back home to China.
“In reality, they sort of come over here, they’re in a bubble, they pick up technical skills, and then they go back to China and put them to use for either the military directly or for corporations that are either utilized by the Chinese military or that are trying to undermine U.S. technology companies,” Whiton said. “We really are essentially educating and arming our chief adversary in the world.”
Former Rep. Michelle Steel, a California Republican who served on the House foreign and intelligence committees, told Fox News Digital that Chinese students educated in the U.S. essentially return home without an appreciation for America.
“After they study here, they took all of our brains here, and they took everything back to their country, and they are using to attack United States. And they hate United States after that education. Guess what we are teaching in the universities? Not love United States!” Steel, who was born in Korea and grew up in Japan, told Fox News Digital. “They are studying some very sensitive things in our universities. We really had to vet them well.”
In her eyes, U.S. universities have prioritized bringing in international students for economic gain.
Rep. Michelle Steel, R-Calif., on Capitol Hill on May 23, 2024. (Michael A. McCoy/Getty Images)
“Because of all the money,” she said. “They try to build their endowments, and they want to just show how big their research center is.”
She cited the case against former Chair of Harvard University’s Chemistry and Chemical Biology Department, Dr. Charles Lieber, who was convicted in 2023 of lying to federal authorities about his affiliation with the People’s Republic of China’s Thousand Talents Program and the Wuhan University of Technology (WUT) in Wuhan, China. Federal prosecutors said Lieber had been paid $1.5 million by the CCP and failed to report additional income of $50,000 payments per month from the WUT.
“It’s not just at University of Michigan, but it’s just everywhere,” Steel said. “We cannot bring everybody in to these universities and studying together and helping to build CCP’s military. That’s just totally no-no, because you know what they’re doing in the Pacific areas and African countries and South American countries. And they’re just expanding everywhere. And we are the only one [who] can stop [it]. And I think President Trump is doing great job.”
The former congresswoman pointed to how the House Select Committee on the CCP in 2023 uncovered a $220 million payment made by the Chinese government to the University of California at Berkeley to help build a massive, joint institute in China – funding which UC Berkeley failed to disclose under Section 117 of the Higher Education Act. She has advocated for legislation that would decrease the reporting requirement from $250,000 to $50,000.
Steel also noted that Stanford University – located in the heart of Silicon Valley in California – has a relationship with China’s Peking University, which in turn has ties to the Chinese military and “goes straight into the nuclear program.” The current chair of the House Select Committee on the CCP, Rep. John Moolenaar, R-Mich., penned a letter to Stanford in March over concerns about U.S. universities “admitting large numbers of Chinese nationals into advanced STEM programs, potentially at the expense of qualified Americans.”
