Red flags raised over Chinese communist academics inside U.S. colleges developing advanced tech

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Anew watchdog report is raising concerns that elite American colleges developing advanced technology with military applications have been “infiltrated” by academics who are card-carrying members of the Chinese Communist Party.

The conservative, nonprofit American Accountability Foundation reported it found nearly two dozen Chinese academics working at elite U.S. schools and labs “who, because of the dual-use threat of their research, close ties to the military research sector in China, and/or clear ties to the Chinese Communist Party should be expelled from the United States or never be re-admitted.”

A review by Just the News found at least three Chinese academics affiliated with U.S. universities who have been repeatedly described as members of the CCP, and another Chinese scientist tied to an American college who is a leader within another CCP-controlled Chinese political party.

The new report came out the same week it was revealed that an illegal biolab in California inspected by federal authorities in 2023 and a separate hazardous lab inside a Las Vegas garage searched by the FBI this weekend. Both labs appear tied to a CCP-linked Chinese national who is currently in federal detention awaiting trial for fraud, false statements, and the adulteration of medical devices.

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., the chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigation, told Just the News that the explosion of the number of Chinese academics on U.S. soil was a direct consequence of the Biden administration’s open borders policies and its decision to shut down the FBI’s main counterintelligence program vetting Chinese threats inside U.S. academia.

“Whenever I read these stories, I think back to the start of the Biden administration, where they canceled the program within the Department of Justice to investigate the theft of U.S. intellectual property and universities,” Johnson said in an interview on the Just the News, No Noise television show.

“We need to be fully on guard,” Johnson says

“I mean, that’s where a lot of this intellectual property resides. And so we have to recognize China. They want to be the world superpower. They practice Sun Tzu’s Art of War, you know, win the war without ever fighting a battle. … So we need to be fully on guard.”

Johnson suggested American universities overlook the potential threat of Chinese academics for pure reasons of profit.

“The problem is the universities. They have just an insatiable appetite for more money, whether it’s from the federal government, whether it’s from the Chinese, wherever, they just want more and more and more money,” he said. Most Chinese students pay universities higher “out-of-state” tuition, further incentivizing universities to funnel Chinese students into the U.S.

“And along the way, they’ve accepted money from the Chinese Communist Party. They’ve allowed Chinese students in there and allowed them to steal intellectual property right under their nose,” he added.

The AAF report revealed that multiple Chinese students now at U.S. universities had been members of the CCP, including holding leadership positions inside the local CCP branches of their Chinese universities.

The CCP, a Marxist-Leninist party, won the Chinese civil war under the leadership of Mao Zedong, who ruled the country as a brutal dictator after establishing the People’s Republic of China in 1949. The CCP currently maintains a firm grip on control in China and is led by Chinese strongman Xi Jinping.

Also named in the AAF report was a Chinese scientist who had worked at an American university and who had been a leader within the CCP-controlled China Democratic League (CDL).

The CIA assessed in 1957 that the CDL has “played a leading role under the CCP” in the Chinese government, and argued that “there is little if anything to distinguish between the doctrines of the CDL and CCP.” The CIA said that the CDL “is believed to serve clandestinely the interests of the Chinese Communists in some areas where diplomatic representation is not established and where Communist activities as such would meet with local government opposition.”

“United Front-Affiliated Organization”

The U.S. China Economic and Security Review Commission in 2018 assessed that the CDL was a “United Front-Affiliated Organization.” The House Select Committee on the CCP said that “United Front work is a unique blend of engagement, influence activities, and intelligence operations that the CCP uses to shape its political environment, including to influence other countries’ policy toward the PRC and to gain access to advanced foreign technology.”

The CCP State Council praised the CDL in a 2021 press release, with top CCP officials congratulating the CDL and the State Council saying that “the CDL has made important contributions to the great cause of China’s revolution, development, and reform, as well as the development of the united front work and the cause of multiparty cooperation.”

The AAF report also highlighted one of the Chinese student’s praise for former CCP leader Deng Xiaoping and current CCP leader Xi Jinping, and pointed out that another Chinese scientist now at a U.S. university underwent a Marxist training program prior to coming to the United States.

The American colleges in question include Harvard University, Carnegie Mellon University, Indiana University, and Brown University.

Neither the Chinese academics in question nor the U.S. schools they are affiliated with responded to emailed requests for comment from Just the News.

“Remembering Party History, Loving My China”

The AAF report alleged that “Qianying Cao, a postdoctoral research assistant at a Brown University mathematics lab funded by multiple military services, led the CCP chapter on her campus in China.” The watchdog insisted that “the threat is clear and obvious.”

Cao is listed as a postdoctoral research associate in the applied mathematics department at Brown University. Neither Cao nor the school responded to emailed requests for comment from Just the News.

Cao’s LinkedIn lists her as receiving her PhD at the Ocean University of China and as a postdoctoral researcher at the Dalian University of Technology.

Connections with Chinese national defense apparatus

Dalian University is listed among the “Chinese Universities with the Most 2019 Graduates Employed by Major Defense Companies” by Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology. The center added: “The Dalian University of Technology in 2004 jointly established the National Defense Education College with the Shenyang Military Region (now the Northern Theater Command) to ‘cultivate new military talents for national defense.’ The project included hiring PLA generals as faculty members at the university.”

Dalian is on the Pentagon’s national security blacklist of foreign entities that the War Department considers to be engaged in “problematic activity,” as is Ocean University.

The Ocean University website also indicates that Cao was a member of the CCP as a student. The school in 2013 described her as a “member of the Communist Party of China.” The university said she was part of the “Youth League Committee and vice minister of the Student Union” and that she was “the secretary of the undergraduate Party branch of the Department of Ocean Engineering.”

“In terms of ideology, Cao Qianying, as a member of the Communist Party of China, always emphasizes playing an exemplary role, strictly demanding of herself according to the standards of a Party member,” Ocean University said.

“Upholding Party discipline” considered a virtue

The Chinese university said that “for three consecutive years, this Party history knowledge competition focused on ‘remembering Party history, strengthening Party spirit, appreciating the Party’s kindness, promoting Party building, upholding Party discipline, and rectifying Party conduct.’ It innovated the activity format, enriched practical carriers, and guided students to enhance their love for the Party, always be concerned about the Party, and fulfill their responsibilities to revitalize the Party,” the school said.

Cao’s Google Scholar profile lists her expertise as being “Dynamics, Ocean Engineering, Machine Learning.”

Supported by USAF, Army, Navy, Dep’t of Energy, and other strategic U.S. entities

The Chinese scientist is listed as working at The Crunch Group at Brown. The research group says that it “is supported generously by” the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, the U.S. Army Research Lab, the Office of Naval Research, and the Department of Energy.

The group also says that “the Department of Defense’s Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative, in collaboration with the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, is providing support for our research initiative.” The research group also says that it received federal support from DARPA and NIH.

“Dr. Cao is a huge national security risk. As research shows she is an active member of the Chinese Communist Party at her alma mater, taking a leadership role in the organization,” the AAF reported alleged. “The Crunch Group lab she is a part of has is at the cutting edge of mathematics research for numerous military service research labs giving her a clear pathway to transfer research to the PLA and to develop relationships with individuals in the military research community.”

“We must forever maintain the fighting spirit of the Chinese Communists”

The report by AAF also pointed to “Jingao Xu, an expert in drone research technology at Carnegie Mellon, where DoW runs a software research lab, who led the CCP chapter on his campus.”

The watchdog report argued that “Xu’s research focuses on drone technology and specifically on computing solutions that have shown direct application to warfighting” and that “exacerbating all of these concerns is the fact that Dr. Xu was an active and enthusiastic member of the Chinese Communist Party before he was admitted to the United States.”

Xu’s biography at Carnegie Mellon was active in December but appears to have been recently deleted. Neither Xu nor the university responded to emailed requests for comment from Just the News.

Xu said in an archived copy of his now-deleted biography that his “current work focuses on advancing Edge Computing within Drone-based systems.” Xu also appeared to use his Carnegie Mellon website to recruit PhD students to work at Hong Kong University (HKU).

“I’m joining the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at the University of Hong Kong as a tenure-track Assistant Professor, starting in Spring 2026. I’m actively seeking highly motivated students to join our group at HKU,” Xu wrote.

The Chinese scientist said in his recruitment pitch that his followers would seek to answer “how can cutting-edge CV/AI advances empower running robots, flying drones, and soaring satellites (NOT just excel on datasets or in simulators)?”

Running robots, flying drones

“Note to Prospective Students. Thanks for your interest to join my group,” Xu also wrote in his effort to recruit students to come to Hong Kong. “Our group will work on building mobile systems, with a long-term focus on exploring how cutting-edge CV/AI advances can empower running robots, flying drones, and soaring satellites to operate in the real world, NOT just excel on datasets.”

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), which says it is supported by the CCP-influenced Hong Kong government and which urged its students to “celebrate” the founding of the PRC, in 2025 similarly “announced an open invitation to international undergraduate and postgraduate students currently enrolled at Harvard University, as well as those holding confirmed offers for Harvard degree programs, to continue their academic pursuits at HKUST” in response to visa restrictions proposed by the Trump Administration.

Xu’s Carnegie Mellon page had included “Real World Demonstration” slides on drone technology. Xu noted that he received a PhD and an undergraduate degree from Tsinghua University.

The House Select Committee on the CCP noted in 2024 that Tsinghua is “co-supervised” by the State Administration for Science, Technology, and Industry for National Defense (SASTIND), “an arm of the Chinese government … which seeks to leverage these universities for defense purposes.”

The committee also said that Tsinghua “has a documented history of serving the PRC’s national security and defense apparatus, including involvement in defense research and alleged cyberattacks targeting various international entities.”

Xu was a “counselor” at Tsinghua, according to a story on the Chinese app Weixin, and he praised CCP leaders Deng Xiaoping and Xi Jinping during a 2017 speech.

He said that Deng was the “chief architect of reform and opening up” who had “a broad perspective and an open-minded approach.”

Xu also declared that Xi had an “understanding of and affection for ordinary people at the grassroots level” and then quoted Xi at length.

“We must forever maintain the fighting spirit of the Chinese Communists at the time of the Party’s founding, and forever maintain our sincere devotion to the people,” Xu said in quoting Xi “Cultivating moral character is the foundation of governance; moving from ‘not daring’ and ‘not being able’ to ‘not wanting’ requires forging a strong ideal and belief, which is the soul of a Communist.”

Xu said that “these heartfelt governing philosophies are closely related to his experiences in his youth, and it is these experiences that have given General Secretary Xi Jinping the strong confidence to say” that “we have never been so close to the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.”

Tsinghua’s website also recounted a 2022 speech by Xu at the Tsinghua University’s School of Software’s 2022 graduation ceremony, where Xu was the “Graduate Research Student Representative.”

Xu pointed to the “historic moment” of the “centenary of the founding of the Communist Party of China” and said that “on the path of ‘hard work and serving the country through software,’ the support of our companions fills us with strength.”

Xu argued in his speech that “the trade war, the chip war, and the COVID-19 pandemic have also made us keenly aware of the long and arduous road ahead.”

The Lin Feng Counselor Award is closely linked to the CCP. Tsinghua says that, in 1997, Lin Yanzhi — the son of the now-deceased former vice-chairman of the National People’s Congress Lin Feng — helped the school establish the Lin Feng Counselor Award.

Tsinghua University emphasizes that “the university’s Party Committee has always attached great importance to the development of the counselor team” and that “counselors are student ideological and political backbones carefully cultivated by the university’s Party Committee.”

Xu’s own online biography — which had been linked on his archived but since-deleted Carnegie Mellon webpage — states that he was “Counsellor of 85 Undergraduates of Class 2017” and that “I was honored by Tsinghua Lin-Feng Counsellor Award and 12.9 Counsellor Award, the Toppest [sic] and Top awards for counsellors in Tsinghua University!”

Carnegie Mellon University’s Software Engineering Institute notes that it is “a Federally Funded Research and Development Center” that is a “public–private partnership that conducts research for the United States government” — specifically the Defense Department.

AAF contended in its report that “the expertise Xu is developing in the United States has clear defense applications, and further, when he returns to China, he would be in a strong position to take the expertise he has developed and apply it quickly to enhancing the capabilities of the People’s Liberation Army.”

“Serve the country through science and tech, and become a person needed by the Party”

The report penned by AAF further said that “Yingkai Dong, who is a leading expert on exoskeletons that could enhance infantry operations, was also an active supporter of the CCP in China.” He is affiliated with Harvard University. 

The foundation said that “in addition to the threat of technology transfer from Dong’s research is his strong, active, and public support in China for the Chinese Communist Party” and that “the combined features make him a significant threat.”

Dong is currently listed as working at the Slade Lab at Harvard, and his “project” is described as “personalizing exoskeleton assistance.”

Just the News attempted to reach Dong through Patrick Slade, an assistant professor of bio-engineering at Harvard who has done extensive research on exoskeleton technology and who runs the Harvard lab to which Dong is linked, but did not receive a response to the email that was sent.

Harvard also did not respond to an emailed request for comment from Just the News.

Dong’s 2022 online biography said that he was pursuing his undergraduate degree at the Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech) and that “he is researching impedance control and robotics parameter identification.”

An article by SUSTech in 2022 included a photo of Dong at a “Summer Youth Marxist Training Program.” The article said he also underwent some “freshman military training.” The article further said Dong was named the “Outstanding Self-Reliant Student” in a selection guided by the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League.

“Dong Yinkai submitted his application to join the Communist Party of China in his first month of school. After being nurtured, observed, and developed by the college, he officially joined the Communist Party of China at the end of last year, becoming a proud probationary member,” the article said of Dong. The article said he was then selected to be sent to MIT.

The article said he was “striving to … serve the country through science and technology, and become a person needed by the Party and the country, so that the flower of youth can bloom brilliantly in unremitting struggle.”

A video by SUSTech which was uploaded in 2022 also listed Dong as a “CCP probationary member.”

The Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security in 2022 added SUSTech’s department of mechanical and energy engineering to a red flag list, stating that it was designating SUSTech and other Chinese entities “on the basis that BIS could not verify their bona fides because [of] an end-use check on transactions subject to the Export Administration Regulations.”

Building “super-soldiers”

The lab says that some of its students receive grants through the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship Program. NSF appears to have provided a $5 million grant for work conducted by Slade and other Harvard researchers starting in late 2023 through late 2025 related to “developing and translating an at-home, connected wearable rehabilitation solution to restore arm function and independence for those with upper limb disability.”

Dong appears to have previously worked at Yale University’s The Grab Lab and is also currently listed as a graduate student at Northeastern University’s Shepherd Lab, which focuses on “Robots, Rehabilitation, Locomotion,” the report said.

“Enhancing the physical capabilities of soldiers, whether it is endurance, strength, or agility, Yingkai Dong’s research could literally enable the Chinese army to build super-soldiers for a war in Taiwan or elsewhere,” the AAF report asserted. “He is a leading researcher in this space whose post at Harvard gives him the ability to collaborate with some of the world’s leading exoskeleton scientists and engineers. Further, his documented support for the Chinese Communist Party makes him incredibly receptive to supporting the PLA’s research and espionage activities.”

“Posing next to a hammer and sickle”

The AAF report also said that “Chunyin Zhu, who is a senior member of a CCP-affiliated party in China (and who we have imagery of posing next to a hammer and sickle), is currently working on advanced chemistry research at Indiana University.” The foundation argued that “Dr. Zhu presents a high national security risk rooted in his deep, sustained integration into the CCP-aligned United Front political system while maintaining academic ties to the United States.”

Neither Zhu nor Indiana University responded to emailed requests for comment from Just the News.

Zhu’s LinkedIn page says that he has been a Jiangsu University professor for more than a dozen years. A host of evidence suggests that Zhu is a leader within the China Democratic League — a CCP-controlled party inside China.

An article from 2018 on the Chinese app Weixin said that Zhu was elected “Secretary-General and Organization Committee Member” for the aforementioned China Democratic League at Jiangsu University. The meeting was attended by the “Director of the United Front Work Department of the Party Committee of Jiangsu University.”

A 2021 article said that fifteen party members, including Zhu, “were awarded as outstanding individuals” at a conference for the Jiangsu Provincial Committee of the China Democratic League.

This meeting was attended by the “Vice Chairman of the Jiangsu Provincial Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference” — dubbed the CPPCC. The Congressional Research Service (CRS) said in 2021 that the Chinese state constitution defines the CPPCC as “a broadly based representative organization of the united front.” The CRS added that the CPPCC has as its explicit mission “upholding and strengthening the Party’s leadership over all areas.”

A 2025 article listed Zhu as the “Director of the Education Committee of the China Democratic League.” The “symposium” described in the article and attended by Zhu included discussion on “optimizing the cultivation of top-notch innovative talents in science and engineering using AI technology” and “AI-enabled talent cultivation.”

The House Select Committee on the CCP also noted in 2024 that Jiangsu University is “co-supervised” by the aforementioned SASTIND.

The Google Patents index includes an “Application filed by Indiana University Research and Technology Corp” from 2012, where Zhu sought a patent with Silas Cook, who remains a professor in the chemistry department at Indiana University.

Indiana University has collaborated with the U.S. military on a number of research projects.

“Dr. Zhu is high risk because he combines deep, demonstrable integration into the CCP’s united front political apparatus with prior and continuing access to U.S. academic institutions that maintain defense research agreements,” the AAF report argued. “Even though his chemistry research is not exclusively military, the convergence of political loyalty, current PRC institutional employment, and prior U.S. access raises concerns about influence, trustworthiness, and potential exploitation of academic channels.”