Chinese Scientists Are Leaving the United States

[Bogeyman]

Facing an increasingly suspicious research climate, a growing number of Chinese scientists are leaving the United States for positions abroad, the latest indicator of how worsening U.S.-China relations are complicating academic collaboration and could hamstring Washington’s tech ambitions.

Chinese scientists living in the United States have for decades contributed to research efforts driving developments in advanced technology and science. But a growing number of them may now be looking elsewhere for work, as deteriorating geopolitical relations fuel extra scrutiny of Chinese researchers and Beijing ramps up efforts to recruit and retain talent. Between 2010 and 2021, the number of Chinese scientists leaving the United States has steadily increased, according to new research published last month. If the trend continues, experts warn that the brain drain could deal a major blow to U.S. research efforts in the long run.

“It’s absolutely devastating,” said David Bier, the associate director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute. “So many of the researchers that the United States depends on in [the] advanced technology field are from China, or are foreign students, and this phenomenon is certainly going to negatively impact U.S. firms and U.S. research going forward.”

From semiconductor chips to artificial intelligence, technology has been at the forefront of U.S.-China competition, with both Washington and Beijing maneuvering to strangle each other’s sectors. Cooperation, even in key sectors like combating climate change, has been rare.

From 2010 to 2021, the number of scientists of Chinese descent who left the United States for another country has surged from 900 to 2,621, with scientists leaving at an expedited rate between 2018 and 2021, according to research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). Nearly half of this group moved to China and Hong Kong in 2010, the study said, and a growing percentage of Chinese scientists have relocated to China over the years.

While this number represents a small fraction of the Chinese scientists in the United States, the uptick reflects researchers’ growing concerns and broader apprehension amid a tense geopolitical climate. After surveying 1,304 Chinese American researchers, the report found that 89 percent of respondents wanted to contribute to U.S. science and technology leadership. Yet 72 percent also reported feeling unsafe as researchers in the United States, while 61 percent had previously considered seeking opportunities outside of the country.

“Scientists of Chinese descent in the United States now face higher incentives to leave the United States and lower incentives to apply for federal grants,” the report said. There are “general feelings of fear and anxiety that lead them to consider leaving the United States and/or stop applying for federal grants.”

The incentives to leave are twofold. Beijing has funneled resources into research and development programs and has long attempted to recruit scientists, even its own, from around the world. For one of its initiatives, the Thousand Talents Plan, Beijing harnessed at least 600 recruitment stations worldwide to acquire new talent. “China has been really trying to lure back scientists for a long time,” said Eric Fish, the author of China’s Millennials.

But this latest outflow of Chinese scientists accelerated in 2018, the same year that then-U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled the China Initiative, a controversial program that was aimed at countering IP theft—and cast a chill over researchers of Chinese descent and collaborations with Chinese institutions. In 2020, he also issued a proclamation denying visas for graduate students and researchers affiliated with Chinese universities associated with the military.

Although the Biden administration shut down the China Initiative, experts warn that its shadow still looms over Chinese scientists. More than one-third of respondents in the PNAS survey reported feeling unwelcome in the United States, while nearly two-thirds expressed concerns about research collaboration with China.

“There is this chilling effect that we’re still witnessing now, where there is a stigma attached to collaboration with China,” said Jenny Lee, a professor at the Center for the Study of Higher Education at the University of Arizona.


The challenges are emblematic of how the breakdown in U.S.-China relations has thrown universities into a geopolitical firestorm, particularly as some states’ lawmakers pressure them to sever ties with Chinese counterparts. On the U.S. side, interest in Mandarin language studies and study abroad has plummeted over the years, largely the result of worsening ties, Beijing’s growing repression, and the coronavirus pandemic. Today, while there are roughly 300,000 Chinese students in America, only 350 Americans studied in China in the most recent academic year. If interest continues to recede, experts warn of spillover effects that could hamper Washington’s understanding of Beijing.

“We’re losing a generation of people who are knowledgeable about China,” said Daniel Murphy, the former director of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. “I’m concerned that the United States is going about this issue in a way that excessively focuses on risks of the academic relationship, without due consideration for the benefits. And I think we see this in a whole host of arenas, and that it’s bipartisan.”

At the same time as a growing number of Chinese scientists exit the United States, new students appear to be facing higher barriers to entry as student visa denials and backlogs reach record high levels. According to a blog post by the Cato Institute, student visa denials peaked at about 35 percent in 2022—the highest rate recorded in two decades.

Student visa denial data is not available by nationality, but Bier, the Cato Institute expert who wrote the piece, said that there is a high degree of correlation between denial rates for B-visas, or tourist visas, and student visas. “Having reviewed the B-visa denials in China, it’s pretty clear that the Chinese overall visa denial rate has increased significantly over the last few years and is at a level now where it’s the highest it’s been in decades,” he said.

Just as some Chinese scientists are looking abroad, these challenges are pushing a growing number of international students to turn elsewhere for academic opportunities. Students are increasingly heading to countries like Canada, Australia, Japan, and the United Kingdom, all of which are opening their doors to high-skilled workers and researchers. To attract more talent, the United Kingdom has issued “Global Talent” and “High Potential Individual” visas, which allow scholars from top universities to work there for 2-3 years and 1-5 years, respectively.

Universities are being impacted “by geopolitical tensions, by political agendas, and so it’s certainly inhibiting U.S. universities’ ability to attract the best and brightest,” Lee said.

Chinese Scientists Are Leaving the United States

Here’s why that spells bad news for Washington.

foreignpolicy.com

 

[Bogeyman]

Facing an increasingly suspicious research climate, a growing number of Chinese scientists are leaving the United States for positions abroad, the latest indicator of how worsening U.S.-China relations are complicating academic collaboration and could hamstring Washington’s tech ambitions.

Chinese scientists living in the United States have for decades contributed to research efforts driving developments in advanced technology and science. But a growing number of them may now be looking elsewhere for work, as deteriorating geopolitical relations fuel extra scrutiny of Chinese researchers and Beijing ramps up efforts to recruit and retain talent. Between 2010 and 2021, the number of Chinese scientists leaving the United States has steadily increased, according to new research published last month. If the trend continues, experts warn that the brain drain could deal a major blow to U.S. research efforts in the long run.

“It’s absolutely devastating,” said David Bier, the associate director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute. “So many of the researchers that the United States depends on in [the] advanced technology field are from China, or are foreign students, and this phenomenon is certainly going to negatively impact U.S. firms and U.S. research going forward.”

From semiconductor chips to artificial intelligence, technology has been at the forefront of U.S.-China competition, with both Washington and Beijing maneuvering to strangle each other’s sectors. Cooperation, even in key sectors like combating climate change, has been rare.

From 2010 to 2021, the number of scientists of Chinese descent who left the United States for another country has surged from 900 to 2,621, with scientists leaving at an expedited rate between 2018 and 2021, according to research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). Nearly half of this group moved to China and Hong Kong in 2010, the study said, and a growing percentage of Chinese scientists have relocated to China over the years.

While this number represents a small fraction of the Chinese scientists in the United States, the uptick reflects researchers’ growing concerns and broader apprehension amid a tense geopolitical climate. After surveying 1,304 Chinese American researchers, the report found that 89 percent of respondents wanted to contribute to U.S. science and technology leadership. Yet 72 percent also reported feeling unsafe as researchers in the United States, while 61 percent had previously considered seeking opportunities outside of the country.

“Scientists of Chinese descent in the United States now face higher incentives to leave the United States and lower incentives to apply for federal grants,” the report said. There are “general feelings of fear and anxiety that lead them to consider leaving the United States and/or stop applying for federal grants.”

The incentives to leave are twofold. Beijing has funneled resources into research and development programs and has long attempted to recruit scientists, even its own, from around the world. For one of its initiatives, the Thousand Talents Plan, Beijing harnessed at least 600 recruitment stations worldwide to acquire new talent. “China has been really trying to lure back scientists for a long time,” said Eric Fish, the author of China’s Millennials.

But this latest outflow of Chinese scientists accelerated in 2018, the same year that then-U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled the China Initiative, a controversial program that was aimed at countering IP theft—and cast a chill over researchers of Chinese descent and collaborations with Chinese institutions. In 2020, he also issued a proclamation denying visas for graduate students and researchers affiliated with Chinese universities associated with the military.

Although the Biden administration shut down the China Initiative, experts warn that its shadow still looms over Chinese scientists. More than one-third of respondents in the PNAS survey reported feeling unwelcome in the United States, while nearly two-thirds expressed concerns about research collaboration with China.

“There is this chilling effect that we’re still witnessing now, where there is a stigma attached to collaboration with China,” said Jenny Lee, a professor at the Center for the Study of Higher Education at the University of Arizona.


The challenges are emblematic of how the breakdown in U.S.-China relations has thrown universities into a geopolitical firestorm, particularly as some states’ lawmakers pressure them to sever ties with Chinese counterparts. On the U.S. side, interest in Mandarin language studies and study abroad has plummeted over the years, largely the result of worsening ties, Beijing’s growing repression, and the coronavirus pandemic. Today, while there are roughly 300,000 Chinese students in America, only 350 Americans studied in China in the most recent academic year. If interest continues to recede, experts warn of spillover effects that could hamper Washington’s understanding of Beijing.

“We’re losing a generation of people who are knowledgeable about China,” said Daniel Murphy, the former director of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. “I’m concerned that the United States is going about this issue in a way that excessively focuses on risks of the academic relationship, without due consideration for the benefits. And I think we see this in a whole host of arenas, and that it’s bipartisan.”

At the same time as a growing number of Chinese scientists exit the United States, new students appear to be facing higher barriers to entry as student visa denials and backlogs reach record high levels. According to a blog post by the Cato Institute, student visa denials peaked at about 35 percent in 2022—the highest rate recorded in two decades.

Student visa denial data is not available by nationality, but Bier, the Cato Institute expert who wrote the piece, said that there is a high degree of correlation between denial rates for B-visas, or tourist visas, and student visas. “Having reviewed the B-visa denials in China, it’s pretty clear that the Chinese overall visa denial rate has increased significantly over the last few years and is at a level now where it’s the highest it’s been in decades,” he said.

Just as some Chinese scientists are looking abroad, these challenges are pushing a growing number of international students to turn elsewhere for academic opportunities. Students are increasingly heading to countries like Canada, Australia, Japan, and the United Kingdom, all of which are opening their doors to high-skilled workers and researchers. To attract more talent, the United Kingdom has issued “Global Talent” and “High Potential Individual” visas, which allow scholars from top universities to work there for 2-3 years and 1-5 years, respectively.

Universities are being impacted “by geopolitical tensions, by political agendas, and so it’s certainly inhibiting U.S. universities’ ability to attract the best and brightest,” Lee said.

Chinese Scientists Are Leaving the United States

Here’s why that spells bad news for Washington.

foreignpolicy.com

@Anmdt

When I told you all this was true, you didn't believe me and said that Chinese scholars would stay in the US. But history proved me right.

 

[Huelague]

A grave mistake, to trust Chinese people.

 

[Merzifonlu]

A grave mistake, to trust Chinese people.

Do not generalize people so easily. Do all Chinese pee? Yes. But there is no further generalization if we are talking about people.

 

[Bogeyman]

A grave mistake, to trust Chinese people.

“It’s absolutely devastating,” said David Bier, the associate director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute. “So many of the researchers that the United States depends on in [the] advanced technology field are from China, or are foreign students, and this phenomenon is certainly going to negatively impact U.S. firms and U.S. research going forward.”

The brain drain from the USA by Chinese academics undermines the innovation capacity of the USA. It means that the Chinese will no longer work in silicon valleys.

 

[Nilgiri]

The brain drain from the USA by Chinese academics undermines the innovation capacity of the USA. It means that the Chinese will no longer work in silicon valleys.

Impact will be minimal for the US and West. The previous arrangement benefited PRC far more than the US/Canada (and West).

It was fairly ridiculous what I saw when I was in Chengdu facility of Pratt JV, the utter obstinacy of what the CCP bureaucrats imposed on the ecosystem there (on actual genuine reform minded Chinese talent) and then assume IP can be extracted anyway....at some rate they think will be linear instead of diminishing return (that they are finding out now the hard way).

Not surprising what Xi and CCP are doubling down upon and cracking down upon in PRC economy each year increasingly....they just fear free critical thought flourishing when CCP control was inevitably reduced in an area before...so that is all being regressed upon now. Good I say....dont interrupt when the enemy is making a mistake and do all you can to have it keep making that mistake.

They (CCP higher echelons) just don't trust their people....so such a system has its natural divorce and good riddance from Western system after its relative honeymoon when there was more relative benefit and potentials on offer.

I know personally of about a dozen PRC researchers let go from research here on gas turbines. Plenty of folks to replace them.....so they can go back and join the grind in CCP with its heavy institutional deficit in key areas since they love the CCP so much.

Those that provably leave the CCP and actually genuinely invest into the Western system will be accommodated....like say my professor in university from 15 - 20 years ago. Its that simple.

All the CCP minded "transaction" approach is quickly coming to and end. There can be no trust with people who can't trust their own because of all kinds of fear and complexes. West is finally understanding this deeply enough.

 

[Huelague]

The brain drain from the USA by Chinese academics undermines the innovation capacity of the USA. It means that the Chinese will no longer work in silicon valleys.

Others will fill the gap.

 

[Bogeyman]

Impact will be minimal for the US and West. The previous arrangement benefited PRC far more than the US/Canada (and West).

It was fairly ridiculous what I saw when I was in Chengdu facility of Pratt JV, the utter obstinacy of what the CCP bureaucrats imposed on the ecosystem there (on actual genuine reform minded Chinese talent) and then assume IP can be extracted anyway....at some rate they think will be linear instead of diminishing return (that they are finding out now the hard way).

Not surprising what Xi and CCP are doubling down upon and cracking down upon in PRC economy each year increasingly....they just fear free critical thought flourishing when CCP control was inevitably reduced in an area before...so that is all being regressed upon now. Good I say....dont interrupt when the enemy is making a mistake and do all you can to have it keep making that mistake.

They (CCP higher echelons) just don't trust their people....so such a system has its natural divorce and good riddance from Western system after its relative honeymoon when there was more relative benefit and potentials on offer.

I know personally of about a dozen PRC researchers let go from research here on gas turbines. Plenty of folks to replace them.....so they can go back and join the grind in CCP with its heavy institutional deficit in key areas since they love the CCP so much.

Those that provably leave the CCP and actually genuinely invest into the Western system will be accommodated....like say my professor in university from 15 - 20 years ago. Its that simple.

All the CCP minded "transaction" approach is quickly coming to and end. There can be no trust with people who can't trust their own because of all kinds of fear and complexes. West is finally understanding this deeply enough.

I don't think it will be that simple, though. Because they cannot easily fill the absence of 290,000 academics and students. We are not talking about a hinterland of 20-30 thousand people here. This issue also has an important place for the US economy. Foreign students are stimulating the US economy. This mobility will not result immediately from today to tomorrow. But if Trump is re-elected, we will likely see this sharply in US universities and industry.

"
Last year, some 290,000 Chinese students were studying in the US, an 8.6 percent decline from the previous year, data from the Institute of International Education, or IIE, show. In contrast, the number of Indian students in the US stood at about 200,000 last year, a 19 percent rise compared with the previous year."

CHINESE STUDENTS TURNING BACKS ON UNITED STATES - Chinadaily.com.cn

He Yijing, a sophomore student, was sitting in a campus hallway at Zhejiang University of Finance and Economics in Hangzhou, capital of Zhejiang province, on Nov 9, 2021, when she learned that a 24-year-old Chinese graduate student from the University of Chicago had been fatally shot.

epaper.chinadaily.com.cn

I found a very detailed document on the subject.
Distribution of the foreign student population in the United States by state and student origin

https://opendoorsdata.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Open-Doors-2022_State-Sheets.pdf

For more detailed search

IIE Open Doors / International Students

Using Data to Open Doors

opendoorsdata.org

 

[Nilgiri]

I don't think it will be that simple, though. Because they cannot easily fill the absence of 290,000 academics and students. We are not talking about a hinterland of 20-30 thousand people here. This issue also has an important place for the US economy. Foreign students are stimulating the US economy. This mobility will not result immediately from today to tomorrow. But if Trump is re-elected, we will likely see this sharply in US universities and industry.

"
Last year, some 290,000 Chinese students were studying in the US, an 8.6 percent decline from the previous year, data from the Institute of International Education, or IIE, show. In contrast, the number of Indian students in the US stood at about 200,000 last year, a 19 percent rise compared with the previous year."

CHINESE STUDENTS TURNING BACKS ON UNITED STATES - Chinadaily.com.cn

He Yijing, a sophomore student, was sitting in a campus hallway at Zhejiang University of Finance and Economics in Hangzhou, capital of Zhejiang province, on Nov 9, 2021, when she learned that a 24-year-old Chinese graduate student from the University of Chicago had been fatally shot.

epaper.chinadaily.com.cn

I found a very detailed document on the subject.
Distribution of the foreign student population in the United States by state and student origin

https://opendoorsdata.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Open-Doors-2022_State-Sheets.pdf

For more detailed search

IIE Open Doors / International Students

Using Data to Open Doors

opendoorsdata.org

I'm talking about the specific critical strategic areas.....some of which I can speak firsthand.

Could care less what happens to bloated debt economy US has ballooned for itself last 20 years, including its leftie globalist universities and leftie corporatist - big govt cabals.

Sooner those endowments + egos + entitlements face pressure and pop, the better.

The convo there only makes sense to have (on any macro economy topic) when the US govt has some semblance of a balanced budget again after the pop.

Otherwise its like discussing what type of sugar is preferable for a diabetic. It keeps some pencil and paper pusher people employed in some fat cat dummy ecosystem....they rarely broach the topics they "analyse" at any relevant depth....just present some raw surface number and push some conclusion/agenda they already made.

So these "institutions" like Cato miss the woods for the trees as usual on these topics. Harvard say even less, they have vested biased interest on this matter of foreign student gravy train.

Don't believe me? Just look what they say about Turkiye and its politics and compare it to what you know firsthand on the subject.

 

[Saithan]

in Short this is how I see things, quite blunt, but take it with a grain of salt.

scientists in PRC doesn't have the level of freedom scientists enjoy in the western world. So the chinese students in west enjoy and flourish under the freedom, PRC continues on it's road and creates bad vibes with West, and this results in narrowminded people beginning to generalize chinese working and enjoying the fruits of free western world. So the chinese feel targetted. Should they go back to china with their knowledge or go elsewhere.

Dumb western politicians and business owners follow their greed and establish a lot of factories in China, but when PRC doesn't want to play nice, they are faced with difficult choice, profit or principles of free western world. undermine your own country is up there with profits.

PRC (and Türkiye) can always fill up their backlog with domestic scientists until the free world become intolerable and the brilliant scientists come back home (retire) and make do with lesser and lower terms in a backwards university somewhere, contributing to raising the level so people can move up from tilling the soil with their hands.

The problem with that kind of approach is that stupidity gets to sit on all positions of influence and importance while the real smart people will get tired of trying to make good, and just suffice teaching youth so they can get better future, and potentially escape from the country to do good for themselves and the world.

Solving the above mentioned problem (braindrain) requires secularism and merit system, and actually have AI governance to monitor any shady dealings of sort. and Bullets. Nothing says "No" to corruption as a bullet through the skull.

countries/universities should spend time on working in and trying to improve on topics like AI in Large Scale Analysis of images in Oncology, and stuff like that.

 

[Nilgiri]

in Short this is how I see things, quite blunt, but take it with a grain of salt.

scientists in PRC doesn't have the level of freedom scientists enjoy in the western world. So the chinese students in west enjoy and flourish under the freedom, PRC continues on it's road and creates bad vibes with West, and this results in narrowminded people beginning to generalize chinese working and enjoying the fruits of free western world. So the chinese feel targetted. Should they go back to china with their knowledge or go elsewhere.

Dumb western politicians and business owners follow their greed and establish a lot of factories in China, but when PRC doesn't want to play nice, they are faced with difficult choice, profit or principles of free western world. undermine your own country is up there with profits.

PRC (and Türkiye) can always fill up their backlog with domestic scientists until the free world become intolerable and the brilliant scientists come back home (retire) and make do with lesser and lower terms in a backwards university somewhere, contributing to raising the level so people can move up from tilling the soil with their hands.

The problem with that kind of approach is that stupidity gets to sit on all positions of influence and importance while the real smart people will get tired of trying to make good, and just suffice teaching youth so they can get better future, and potentially escape from the country to do good for themselves and the world.

Solving the above mentioned problem (braindrain) requires secularism and merit system, and actually have AI governance to monitor any shady dealings of sort. and Bullets. Nothing says "No" to corruption as a bullet through the skull.

countries/universities should spend time on working in and trying to improve on topics like AI in Large Scale Analysis of images in Oncology, and stuff like that.

I can tell you right now, govt/bureaucracy will be the absolute last place AI is allowed to permeate in any meaningful way (if it is allowed at all)...whatever the political system set up and operating.

The whole enterprise of politics (push come to shove at the resolutions that matter) is run by nepotism, favouritism, contact lists, access, favours and all the other bits of the buffet that make up corruption (in the interest of maximising entitlement/privilege of the powerful and keeping accountability and single-standard consistency nominal and low as possible).

Rules for thee but not for me (i.e AI will be deployed as we see fit on you to improve and impose upon you, but not on us).

This is a metaphysical thing that drives it, its not rational, objective or material.

 

[Bogeyman]

Biden Puts U.S.-China Science Partnership on Life Support​

A landmark agreement underpinning decades of U.S.-China research cooperation narrowly escaped death this week after the Biden administration announced it would seek a brief extension to the pact, bucking pressure from Republican lawmakers and highlighting how scientific collaborations have emerged as a key flash point amid rising tensions.

Since taking force in 1979, the U.S.-China Science and Technology Cooperation Agreement (STA) has set the norms for scientific collaboration between Washington and Beijing in areas ranging from air pollution to public health—as long as it is renewed, as it always has been roughly every five years. With its next expiration date looming on Sunday, a group of Republicans had urged the Biden administration to terminate the pact, part of a broader push as Washington zeroes in on the threats posed by China’s intellectual property theft and espionage.

By briefly extending the agreement for six months—rather than renewing it for another five-year period—experts and officials say the Biden administration may have more room to exert pressure on Beijing and negotiate amendments, such as boosting intellectual property protections. China attaches symbolic importance to the pact, said E. William Colglazier, a former science and technology advisor to the U.S. secretary of state currently at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and Chinese officials have called for its continuation.

“The proposition behind a relatively short-term renewal would be to use that period to engage in intense discussions with the Chinese counterparts on any changes that the two sides could agree to that would strengthen the agreement,” John Holdren, a former director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy currently at the Harvard Kennedy School, said on Tuesday. “The main thing is: Let’s not drop it. Let’s not let it expire.”

If the 44-year-old pact expired, its end would deal yet another blow to already faltering U.S.-China scientific collaborations—and Washington’s own tech ambitions. As relations deteriorate, the resulting pressures have cascaded into the research arena, straining existing university partnerships and stifling academic exchanges. Confronted with a chillier research climate, a small—but growing—number of Chinese scientists are seeking opportunities outside the United States. The collapse of this agreement, experts warn, could accelerate these trends.

“Without the implicit permission that the existence of this overarching framework provides, there will be many institutions, many individuals, who would simply not engage with their Chinese counterparts because they would consider it something that the government does not consider a good thing to do,” Holdren said. “A lot of the interactions wouldn’t happen.”

Graham Webster, a research scholar at the Stanford University Cyber Policy Center, characterized the push to allow the STA to expire as an example of “boneheaded decoupling.” While there are very legitimate debates about what kind of restrictions should be implemented, he said, it’s not reasonable to assert that there are no benefits to U.S.-China collaborations in science and technology.

“There’s no real reckoning with the plusses and minuses of an individual interaction with China,” he said. “There’s only the assumption that if there’s a downside, we have to kill it.”

Science and technology agreements themselves are not unique; Washington has signed nearly 60 such pacts with other countries that effectively legitimize research collaborations, offering a broader framework for American researchers and institutions to engage with the world. While having an STA is not required for cooperation in those fields, “it does give the blessing of both sides,” said Mark Cohen, the Asia IP Project director at the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology.

For Washington and Beijing, the creation of the U.S.-China STA is historically significant, representing the two countries’ first bilateral agreement after they normalized relations. Ever since, the agreement has been continuously renewed—albeit with a lapse after China crushed the Tiananmen protests in 1989—and undergone multiple alterations.

“The STA is part of the foundational reopening of U.S.-China ties,” Webster said. “It’s become important because it’s the backdrop for the two countries to have many of their scientific and technological exchanges over the decades.”

This landscape has transformed considerably in recent decades as Beijing has revamped itself into a science research powerhouse and lawmakers ramp up efforts to combat Chinese IP theft and economic espionage. The latest scrutiny over the STA’s expiration reflects how science and tech collaborations have become completely enmeshed with national security concerns and economic competition—and the challenge in weighing the risks of cooperation against the benefits.

“The policies and programs that [China’s] put in place, and its actions, really aren’t in line with open, transparent collaboration,” said Anna Puglisi, a senior fellow at Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, who noted how Beijing recently restricted access to its open academic publications. “Are we benefiting as much as we are giving?”

U.S. Reps. Mike Gallagher and Elise Stefanik have spearheaded the push to end the STA, penning a letter, alongside eight other Republican lawmakers, urging U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to allow the STA to expire and “put America’s national security first” in June. Former Trump officials Michael Kratsios and Erik Jacobs also echoed these calls in a recent op-ed, where they argued that the “agreement has become a conduit for Chinese malfeasance.”

“The evidence available suggests that the PRC [People’s Republic of China] will continue to look for opportunities to exploit partnerships organized under the STA to advance its military objectives to the greatest extent possible and, in some cases, to attempt to undermine American sovereignty,” the letter said. “The United States must stop fueling its own destruction.” China’s infamous spy balloon technology, for example, resembled the instrumented balloons used in a 2018 atmospheric science research partnership organized under the STA, the letter said.

Professors and other experts have pushed back in favor of the STA, citing the benefits derived from open research collaborations and the importance of having a framework for such exchanges. The STA encompasses collaboration in research areas ranging from climate change to medical research, all of which could be impacted if the pact breaks down.

“I hope that what we can do is separate out technology concerns from science,” said Deborah Seligsohn, a political scientist at Villanova University. “Basic research is different than technology transfer or intellectual property or any of that stuff. That’s all very applied.”

Having an STA in place can help address intellectual property disputes that may result from bilateral collaboration, Cohen said. It can provide “a vehicle for talking about the issues that inevitably arise—even in a good relationship,” he said.

“For the world to be at peace, and to deal with things like climate change and deal with a pandemic, it’s going to require the United States and China cooperating,” Colglazier said. “Engagement in science is one lever.”

Biden Puts U.S.-China Science Partnership on Life Support

The collapse of a landmark agreement would deal another blow to already fraught U.S.-China research collaborations.

foreignpolicy.com

 

[Bogeyman]

Expulsions of Chinese Students Spread Confusion From Yale to UVA​

Customs agents at US airports have barred entry to at least 20 students and scholars with valid visas since November in ‘more insidious’ version of disbanded China Initiative.




The questions from the US Customs and Border Patrol agent in a windowless room at Dulles International Airport seemed relentless: Was she a member of the Chinese Communist Party? Did she receive scholarship funding from the Chinese government? Who sent her here?

Susan, a second-year Ph.D. student in biomedical imaging at the University of Virginia returning to the US after visiting her parents in China, said she had nothing to do with the Chinese government or its ruling party. But her answers on this exam didn’t matter: Her student visa was canceled, and she was forced to buy a $1,400 one-way ticket back to Beijing. Seventeen hours later, on the last day of last year, she was escorted onto an airplane by armed guards and barred for five years.

“This has really, completely destroyed my life,” Susan, who asked that her real name not be used for fear of reprisals, said in a tearful video interview from her family home in China.

Susan was one of at least 20 Chinese students holding valid visas and studying at universities including Harvard, Yale and Johns Hopkins who have met a similar fate since November, according to data compiled by Bloomberg News. Her account and those of others who asked not to be identified were confirmed by their lawyers, blog posts and the Chinese government, which issued an unusual travel warning for Dulles airport in January and said that even Chinese officials invited by the US have been “harassed and interrogated” by Customs agents.

A spokesman for the Customs agency said it has a duty to protect the nation’s borders and that “all international travelers attempting to enter the United States, including all US citizens, are subject to examination.” He declined to answer questions about procedures, expulsions and individual cases, or to provide any data.

The visa cancellations run counter to efforts to expand educational, cultural and business exchanges endorsed by both US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping when they met in San Francisco in November. And they come as policymakers take other anti-Chinese actions, including a bill seeking to force the sale of TikTok and state measures to bar Chinese nationals from buying property or teaching at public universities.


The expulsions also highlight divisions within the Biden administration. Customs agents, who work for the US Department of Homeland Security, are canceling student visas approved by the State Department. Those visas only allow people to land at US airports, but Customs agents have the power to deny entry. The State Department, which issued 105,000 Chinese student and scholar visas in the fiscal year that ended in September, declined to comment. Nicholas Burns, US ambassador to China, said in a May 8 post on X that “99.9% of Chinese students holding visas encounter no issues upon entering the United States.”

Two years ago, the Biden administration ended a controversial Trump-era policy known as the China Initiative that purported to root out spies but resulted in more ruined careers than successful prosecutions. Now that program has been succeeded by a piecemeal effort — one that’s largely hidden from public view. Instead of targeting prominent academics, Customs agents are expelling Ph.D. and postdoctoral students, as well as company employees, by secret administrative actions with no public accountability or right to appeal.

The secrecy makes what’s going on “much more insidious now,” said Gisela Perez Kusakawa, executive director of the Asian American Scholar Forum, a nonprofit organization that promotes academic freedom.

“The end of the China Initiative wasn’t the end, they’re just not calling it that anymore,” said Ivan Kanapathy, senior vice president at Beacon Global Strategies, a national security advisory firm in Washington, and a former National Security Council official in the Trump administration.

For Susan, the Air China flight from Beijing was routine. She slid her passport and visa across the counter at Dulles, as she had done many times before. But this time was different. She was pulled aside by a Customs agent, she said, then interrogated, searched, called a liar and held in solitary confinement in a chilly room overnight before being sent back to China. “I don’t have these relationships, I promise,” she said she told the agent when asked about connections to the Communist Party. “I insist I am innocent.”


In another case, a fifth-year Ph.D. student at Yale who was supposed to defend her thesis in cell biology this year, was detained at Dulles two weeks before Susan by the same Customs agent. Writing under a pseudonym, Meng Fei, she described her 20-hour ordeal in a blog post, saying she was subject to “not only racial but gender discrimination.” She, too, was put on a plane back to China at her own expense and told she was banned from the US for five years. Reached by email, she said the account was accurate but declined to speak further and asked that her real name not be used citing emotional trauma.

Unlike Susan, who says she was never given a reason for her exclusion, Meng was told she was being expelled because of Presidential Proclamation 10043, according to her lawyer, Dan Berger, who has served the Customs agency with a motion to reconsider. The proclamation, which dates to June 2020, seeks to deny student visas to anyone with a connection to universities in China known to engage in what it calls “military-civil fusion,” or actions by or for the Chinese government to acquire foreign technologies to advance its military capabilities.

The US has never published a list of universities banned by the proclamation, though Chinese media have named eight schools that have triggered exclusions, along with funding from the China Scholarship Council, which requires students to return to China after they complete their studies. One person familiar with the rule who requested anonymity to discuss national security matters said the US hasn’t published a list because officials want to be able to expand or change the definitions of what constitutes a threat as needed.

Berger said he can’t understand why his client would have been subject to the proclamation, as nothing in her background indicates ties to any of the banned universities or to state funding, and her visa was renewed by the State Department just last year. “The list of military-civil fusion universities is simple, but what the boundaries are is unclear,” said Berger. “We’re not seeing any consistent trends pointing to new guidance.” Berger said he hasn’t heard anything from Customs and isn’t aware of any reversals.

Marta Meng, founder of the Meng Law Group in Covina, California, who represents Susan and three other expelled students seeking to overturn their bans, said no reason was given to her clients or in transcripts of the airport interviews that she has reviewed.

That’s a problem for learning institutions, said Toby Smith, who handles government relations and public policy at the Association of American Universities, which acts on behalf of 71 research universities including the University of Virginia, Yale and other schools with recently banned students. “Despite asking for additional clarity, the specific items that would result in visa denial for Chinese graduate students under Proclamation 10043 have never been disclosed to our universities,” he said. “So we have been left only to speculate as to what might spark such denials.”


A spokesman for the University of Virginia said he couldn’t comment on Susan’s case except to say that the university is “working with federal agencies to better understand their approach and what recourse may be available to students who are affected.” A Yale spokesman said the university is working with each affected student to provide legal and funding support, and “when possible, to ensure that they can find ways to seek redress with government agencies so that they can return to the US to continue their research and studies.” For Meng Fei, that may mean defending her thesis remotely from China.

When the Biden administration ended the China Initiative, it said that a 2021 national security memorandum about vetting foreign students would remain in effect. It instructs the State Department to work with Homeland Security to ensure that the granting of visas reflects “the changing nature of risks” to US research. But it doesn’t specify what those risks are or how the agencies should be coordinating enforcement.

“The question is, who is coordinating the whole thing, the guidelines and procedures for law enforcement,” said Steven Pei, an electrical engineering professor at the University of Houston and co-organizer of the Asian Pacific American Justice Task Force, which advocates against racial discrimination. “We are trying hard to balance national security, US competitiveness with China in high tech and civil rights,” he said. “But this top-level policy has not trickled down.”

At the University of Virginia lab where Susan did her research, Soumee Guha, an international student from India, spoke glowingly about her colleague. “She’s one of the sweetest people I have met here,” Guha said one day last month. “She’s always ready to help people.”

Sometimes, when they need to blow off steam, the students shine their cell phone flashlights at a disco ball suspended from the ceiling and dance around. “We tend to grow a different life in a new country,” said Guha. “We go back home, but this is also home.”

Guha and the other students in the lab don’t understand why Susan was expelled, but a clue may be in a description of her work on the university’s website: “Her research interests include medical AI.” Could it be as simple as that, a one-sentence mention of artificial intelligence at a time when the US aims to block China’s advancement in that technology? “That’s the only thing we can think of,” said another associate who asked that his name not be used because he’s not authorized to speak.

Susan’s lawyer said she mentioned her interest in AI when asked by the Customs agent at Dulles what she intended to do after graduation, but that it wasn’t cited as a reason for her expulsion. She told the agent she would be open to returning to China or to staying in the US.


At Susan’s desk, one of eight in the electrical engineering lab, her name remains scrawled in black marker on a glass partition. A few books on a shelf and an empty red chair await her return.

Customs hasn’t responded to her lawyer’s motion to rescind the five-year ban, and there’s no set time frame for it to do so. Though five months have passed, Susan remains traumatized about her treatment. She said she spent her whole life focused on getting a Western education and just wants to use her degree to help with medical issues like improving cancer diagnoses.

“That officer misunderstood and recorded my information incorrectly, then asked me why I didn’t tell the truth,” Susan said, recalling the cold room where she was locked overnight without her eyeglasses, with only a mat on the floor and no privacy to use the toilet. On the airplane home, on New Year’s Eve, she burst into tears when the flight attendant announced it was midnight and other passengers cheered.

Now she sits in a white room in her parents’ apartment in northern China feeling hopeless. “I don’t know what to do,” she said.

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