MLive: GOP lawmakers want Eastern Michigan to cut ties with Chinese universities
YPSILANTI, MI - Lawmakers are calling on Eastern Michigan University and other Michigan colleges to end their schools’ partnerships with Chinese universities.
U.S. Rep. John Moolenaar, R-Caledonia and U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Lenawee County called on the Ypsilanti university to cut ties with Beibu Gulf University and Guangxi University through the Joint Engineering Program and the Information Security Joint Program in China, per a letter to university President James Smith on Tuesday, Feb. 18.
“The research at your university is funded by the American people and must be protected,” Moolenaar and Walberg wrote.
Moolenaar is chairman of the House Select Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, and Walberg chairs the House Education and Workforce Committee. The pair made similar demands to Oakland University and the University of Detroit Mercy, urging the colleges to end its relationships with China-based institutions.
“In establishing these articulation agreements, EMU complies with all federal laws including those related to information and technology transfer,” university spokesperson Melissa Thrasher said. “We are carefully evaluating the concerns presented and will respond to them in the immediate future.”
Moolenaar and Walberg wrote there is particular concern over EMU’s partnership with Beibu Gulf University and the GameAbove College of Engineering and Technology.
The university’s GameAbove College “receives privileged federal funding to advance U.S. cybersecurity programs,” the letter states. The college is designated as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense by the National Security Agency.
Moolenaar and Walberg wrote that sending university faculty on year-long appointments to China “effectively transfers U.S. national security resources and expertise to an adversary nation.”
Faculty research and collaborate with Chinese counterparts and train 300 students annually in strategic engineering programs, the letter states.
Beibu Gulf University’s “extensive ties to the Chinese military” compound the risks.
The letter comes as the University of Michigan is ending its partnership with a separate Chinese university linked to national security concerns this past fall following an Oct. 31 letter from Moolenaar.
The letter to UM President Santa Ono urged the institution to end its partnership with Shangai Jiao Tong University. The university collaborated with Shanghai Jiao Tong for the last two decades, but the partnership ended Jan. 10.
Last fall, federal charges were filed against five University of Michigan students affiliated with the Chinese university who photographed the 2023 Northern Strike training exercise at Camp Grayling in northern Michigan.
The federal charges against the students, as well as other similar instances at University of California Berkeley and Georgia Institute of Technology, exposed potential risks to academic research integrity and the Shanghai university’s connections to Chinese military innovation, Moolenaar wrote to Ono.