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2025-06-05 Home Front: WoT
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Federal money trail leads to Chinese scientists charged in shocking pathogen plot, memos show
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[JustTheNews] The pair indicted this week worked with a University of Michigan laboratory helmed and the FBI is calling the federal funding a possible bioterrorism security risk.
Two Chinese scientists charged in a shocking plot to smuggle a toxic pathogen into the United States worked at an American laboratory led by more senior Chinese scientists funded by the U.S. government, according to federal spending records and the researchers' own disclosures.
Yunqing Jian, 33, and Zunyong Liu, 34, were charged Tuesday with smuggling a fungus called Fusarium graminearum into the United States in 2024. The fungus is classified in the scientific literature as a “potential agroterrorism weapon” because it affects wheat, barley, maize, and rice by causing “head blight,” according to the Justice Department.
The incident is again raising concerns about the tendrils of Chinese Communist Party influence inside U.S. research institutions and broader society, just five years after the COVID-19 pandemic exposed federal funding to a lab in Wuhan, China where the virus is believed to have escaped and where dangerous gain of function research was being conducted.
The Justice Department noted Yunqing Jian’s electronics contained evidence describing “her membership in and loyalty” to the Chinese Communist Party. The Trump administration, especially the FBI, have doubled down on efforts to root out Chinese Communist Party influence, especially in higher education, by revoking visas for Chinese students at American schools.
FUNDING FROM U.S. TAXPAYERS
Records reviewed by Just the News show that both China-born scientists charged this week were affiliated with a University of Michigan research laboratory led by two senior researchers who are also Chinese citizens and are receiving funding from the National Institutes of Health for studying plant immunity.
Ping He and Libo Shan, both of whom completed their undergraduate studies in China and doctoral and postdoctoral studies in the United States, are the senior faculty members at the Molecular Plant-Microbe Interaction Working Groups housed at the University of Michigan’s Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology. The laboratory conducts research on plant immunity, according to its website.
According to NIH records, Libo Shan and Ping He received more than $7.6 million in total funding between two sponsored projects, awarded one to each scientist. Both NIH projects (R35GM144275 and R35GM149197) were cited in at least two research papers involving both Jian and Liu, the indicted Chinese nationals.
Other research papers on which both Jian and Liu were authors cite awards from the National Science Foundation, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture.
The FBI told Just the News Wednesday night that it is aware of the federal funding trail and believes the entire case exposes a serious national security risk with U.S. scientific research relying on foreign scientists, particularly from commust China.
"The CCP’s quiet infiltration of our research ecosystem is a direct threat to our national security, biosecurity, and economic independence," Erica Knight, an adviser to FBI Director Kash Patel, told Just the News. "The Director understands these threats better than anyone, and under his leadership, we will aggressively root out every trace of corrupt foreign influence."
Sen. Ron Johnson, the chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said the incident shows that the threat of Chinese involvement in dangerous research funded by the U.S. government, first exposed during investigations into COVID-19, is still ongoing.
“It has been obvious for years that Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins not only funded dangerous research, but directed funding to scientists loyal to China, not America,” Johnson told Just the News. “My hope is that we can uncover and expose the extent to which their blatant actions harmed our nation and the world.”
Both Jian and Liu worked with the University of Michigan laboratory led by Shan and He, according to current and archived versions of the laboratory’s webpage.
Niether Dr. Shan nor Dr. He immediately responded to requests for comment from Just the News.
The provided biography shows Yunqing Jian joined the laboratory in August 2022 as a postdoctoral fellow. She is originally from Sichuan, China and completed her doctoral studies at Zhejiang University in China in 2020 where she “studied the mechanisms of how fungi combat with plant-derived stresses,” the web page reads.
The indictment shows that Jian also received funding through China’s "Postdoctoral International Exchange Program and the Second Class of Grants from the 69th Batch of China Postdoctoral Science Foundation” from July 1, 2022, to June 30, 2024.
CHANGED HIS STORY AFTER QUESTIONING BY CBP
Zunyong Liu, who is reportedly in a relationship with Jian, was also affiliated with the laboratory before he returned to China in July 2024 after trying and failing to enter the United States with a red plant material in his backpack, according to the Justice Department indictment. Liu changed his story under interrogation about the biological material, prompting authorities to turn him back.
Liu was listed as a postdoctoral fellow at the Michigan laboratory until shortly before he was turned away at customs, according to an archived version of the website. He is also listed as an author on at least four scientific studies produced under the NIH grants associated with the University's laboratory, the records show.
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Posted by Skidmark 2025-06-05 04:29||
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File under: Commies
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Posted by Whiskey Mike 2025-06-05 05:46||
2025-06-05 05:46||
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Posted by ed in texas 2025-06-05 15:30||
2025-06-05 15:30||
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