American universities shine when they embody American values of free inquiry, a culture of innovation, and dedication to national security. To fulfill this promise, campus leaders must proactively thwart espionage and repression carried out by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Yet universities cannot fulfill this mission on their own. State and federal government leaders must set the rules of the road for dealing with foreign adversaries on campus.
President Trump and Congress should commence a broad higher ed security overhaul by immediately ceasing all U.S. military funding for Chinese military research. Findings from the House Select Committee on the CCP’s new “Fox in the Henhouse” report reveal the extent of the problem. Over the past two years, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) spent $2.5 billion for over 1,400 publications with Chinese co-authors in military-relevant domains such as hypersonics, artificial intelligence, and advanced propulsion. Incredibly, Chinese military researchers were direct participants in more than half of these DoD-funded publications.
The collapse in research security is absurd on its face. Imagine DoD funding Green Berets to train Taiwanese forces to repel an invasion and looping in Chinese special forces for a joint exercise. What if DoD funded research with the Philippines on where to position ground-based anti-ship missiles and then invited Chinese intelligence officers to vet the locations? These preposterous scenarios are the operational equivalent of paying Chinese researchers to co-develop next-generation weapons for the U.S. military.
Allowing the “Fox in the Henhouse” is an apt description for the U.S.’s laissez-faire approach to research security. China penetrates universities, national labs and corporate research institutes seemingly at will – despite decades of warnings from Congress about the CCP’s malign strategy to capture and indigenize American ingenuity.
The unanimous and bipartisan 1999 House Cox Report described how the CCP exploits lax U.S. oversight to acquire sensitive American technologies. Two decades later, another bipartisan report by the Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations concluded that “American taxpayer-funded research has contributed to China’s global rise over the last 20 years” and that Beijing has “openly recruited U.S.-based researchers, scientists, and experts” from federally-funded projects.
If we’re not securing our most sensitive military research, you can be sure that less-sensitive campus intellectual property is wide open for the taking. Further, foreign espionage is rampant, and Beijing regularly directs the repression of dissent on American campuses.
Indeed, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence concluded as much just a few weeks ago. The crown jewels of American innovation and free expression now stand equally at risk.
A concerted effort across the federal government, state governments, and universities themselves is necessary to protect our education institutions.
First, President Trump should catalyze a sea-change in campus culture with an executive order to ban federal departments, subordinate agencies and national labs from funding research in partnership with the Chinese military or Communist Party. Universities that apply for federal grants and contracts should be required to undertake enhanced screening of all personnel and students for military or CCP ties.
Next, Congress should pass CCP Select Committee Chair John Moolenaar’s “Securing American Funding and Expertise from Adversarial Research Exploitation Act of 2025” (or the ‘‘SAFE Research Act”) to codify a ban on federal agencies funding work in science, technology, engineering or mathematics by individuals or institutions from a hostile foreign adversary country. Steep punishments, including criminal prosecution, should be on the table for non-compliance.
Governors should replicate any executive action Trump takes, and state legislatures should codify their own version of the SAFE Research Act. But they should also go further and adopt comprehensive bi-partisan solutions enacted by both Florida and Texas.
Florida passed unanimous legislation in 2021 and 2023 creating a suite of campus security reforms. Sunshine State universities are required to disclose foreign gifts and are prohibited from accepting grants or research collaborations with foreign adversaries, except under specially approved circumstances. Foreign adversary researchers must be thoroughly screened. Criminal penalties are increased for both intellectual property theft and harassment conducted on behalf of an adversary regime. Finally, CCP education software was banned state-wide. Texas’ legislature matched these legislative reforms in 2025 after Gov. Greg Abbott instituted the most sweeping campus security measures of any governor with Executive Order 48 (2024).
From the White House to statehouses, and from coast to coast, a higher education security overhaul is a national security imperative. With Stanford undergraduates decrying Chinese campus espionage, and Harvard becoming renowned as a “party school” for the Chinese Communist Party, the fox must be decisively ejected from the henhouse. That begins by ending American military funding for Chinese military research.
Michael Lucci is founder and CEO of State Armor. Jacqueline Deal is president and CEO of the Long Term Strategy Group, and a State Armor Advisory Board member.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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