‘The CCP is working around the clock to deploy operatives and researchers to infiltrate American institutions,’ FBI Director Kash Patel said.
FBI Director Kash Patel and some Republican lawmakers are sounding the alarm about threats posed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), after two Chinese nationals were charged with smuggling a pathogen into the United States.
“This case is a sobering reminder that the CCP is working around the clock to deploy operatives and researchers to infiltrate American institutions and target our food supply, which would have grave consequences … putting American lives and our economy at serious risk,” Patel wrote on social media platform X on June 3.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Michigan announced charges against Jian Yunqing, 33, and Liu Zunyong, 34, on June 3. According to a criminal complaint, Liu, a researcher currently in China, applied for a B-2 visa in March 2024 and brought the pathogen, a fungus known as Fusarium graminearum, into the United States while visiting Jian, his girlfriend, in July 2024.
According to Patel, Fusarium graminearum is an “agroterrorism agent,” and the fungus can cause “head blight,” a disease that can devastate wheat, barley, maize, and rice and cause health problems in humans and livestock.
Jian is a postdoctoral research fellow at the Molecular Plant-Microbe Interaction Laboratory at the University of Michigan, which offered her a fellowship position in 2023, according to the complaint. She applied for a J-1 visa in June 2022.
The FBI agents found an electronic document in Jian’s cellphone “describing her membership and loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party,” according to the complaint.
The two defendants were charged with visa fraud, conspiracy, making false statements, and smuggling goods into the United States.
“Smuggling a known agroterrorism agent into the U.S. is not just a violation of law, it’s a direct threat to national security,” Patel stated, according to an X post from his spokeswoman, Erica Knight.
Sen. Ashley Moody (R-Fla.), a member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, and Rep. Riley Moore (R-W.Va.), who sits on the House Appropriations Committee, said the latest case highlights the need to pass their legislation (S 1086 and HR 2147), which is called the STOP CCP Visas Act.
“This is insane. These CCP-linked foreign nationals are weaponizing student visas in an attempt to poison our country—AGAIN!!” Moody wrote on X on June 3.
“The time to pass my Stop CCP VISAs Act is now,” Moore wrote.
If enacted, the legislation would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to ban the admission of Chinese nationals as nonimmigrant students.
In recent years, federal prosecutors have brought a number of criminal cases against Chinese students for crimes such as surveilling U.S. military installations and theft of intellectual property.
On May 28, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that his department will work with the Department of Homeland Security to “aggressively revoke” Chinese student visas, specifically targeting those with ties to the CCP or studying in critical fields.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, during a press briefing on June 3, defended Rubio’s decision, saying he “has the right” to do so.
Several other Republican lawmakers also took to X to respond to the smuggling case.
“Thank God we finally have a president who is protecting our national security, holding the CCP accountable and stopping the CCP from sending students to undermine our security,” wrote Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who also sits on the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs.
“This is a major national security threat,” Rep. Lisa McClain (R-Mich.), chairwoman of the House Republican Conference, wrote. “The perpetrators should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
Rep. Ben Cline (R-Va.), member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, stated that the CCP “has a long record of exploiting America’s universities” and Jian and Liu “must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”