By Catherine Yang
Two Chinese nationals, including one who works at the University of Michigan, were charged on June 2 with visa fraud, conspiracy, making false statements, and smuggling a pathogen into the United States.
This comes amid the Trump administration’s announcement of “aggressively” revoking visas for Chinese international students, including those with ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Michigan announced the charges June 3, ahead of defendant Yunqing Jian’s appearance in federal court.
“The alleged actions of these Chinese nationals—including a loyal member of the Chinese Communist Party—are of the gravest national security concerns,” U.S. Attorney Jerome Gorgon said in a statement.
“These two aliens have been charged with smuggling a fungus that has been described as a ‘potential agroterrorism weapon’ into the heartland of America, where they apparently intended to use a University of Michigan laboratory to further their scheme.”
House Select Committee on the CCP Chair Rep. John Moolenaar (R-Mich.), who has cautioned universities in Michigan to end the partnerships with communist China, said in a statement the case should be “fully prosecuted as a threat against our country.”
“This is only further proof that American universities must be more vigilant when it comes to research security and the participation of Chinese nationals in these institutions,” he stated.
According to a criminal complaint, Jian, who currently works at the University of Michigan, is a member of the CCP and her electronics contained information describing her loyalty to the party.
Jian allegedly received funding from the Chinese communist regime’s Postdoctoral International Exchange Program from July 2022–June 2024 to study a fungus called Fusarium graminearum, which is classified as a potential agroterrorism weapon.
The fungus can cause “head blight,” a disease that affects small grain crops and causes losses in the millions of dollars per year in the United States. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) estimates the fungal disease has cost U.S. farmers $3 billion since 1990.
Organisms that can injure, damage, or cause disease in plants require permits from the USDA to import or handle.
Jian applied for a J1 visa in June 2022, which allowed her to do research as a postdoctoral fellow at a university in Texas between August 2022 and August 2023, according to the complaint. Then in August 2023, Jian accepted a fellowship position at the Molecular Plant-Microbe Interaction (MPMI) Laboratory at the University of Michigan. The University of Michigan currently lists Jian as a postdoctoral fellow.
According to the federal complaint, Jian’s U.S. visa application indicated she would “study topics distinct and different” from the fungal pathogen. However, documents were found showing that while Jian was in the United States working for U.S. research institutions, she had continued her work on Fusarium graminearum for a Chinese university.
Codefendant Zunyong Liu, Jian’s boyfriend, had worked together with Jian at the university in Texas and the University of Michigan, and the pair co-authored several scientific papers, until he left the United States to return to Zhejiang University in China where he was studying Fusarium graminearum.
Papers coauthored by Liu show he was a postdoctoral fellow at Texas A&M University. The MPMI website shows a photo of Liu winning an Early Career Scientist Award at the 7th Xanthomonas Genomics Conference in 2022.
Liu applied for a B2 tourist visa in March 2024 and traveled to the United States in July 2024, according to the complaint.
Smuggling Fungal Pathogens
Law enforcement seized electronic devices from Jian and Liu that showed that both had smuggled the fungus into the United States illegally from China.
In a set of messages from August 2022, Liu and Jian exchanged messages about Jian arriving in San Francisco and needing to “be careful” about storing “Teacher Liang’s seeds,” the document shows.
“Where to put it? I only have one pair of shoes. The insole cannot be pulled off,” Jian wrote, according to the complaint. “I put them in my Martin boots … in a small bag. The ziplock bag. Very small. … I stuffed them in the shoes.”
In their communications on the Chinese social media platform WeChat, Liu also discussed the biologics that he smuggled into Jian’s lab at MPMI in 2024 so that he could work on it while visiting on a tourist visa. According to the complaint, the growing fungus was seen by the MPMI lab principal investigator during a laboratory inspection.
MPMI does not have permits to study Fusarium graminearum.
“I just went down to help with your plants. Fortunately, I went,” Jian wrote, according to the complaint. “Your cell death phenotype plants were seen by [the principal investigator].”
“What should I do then? … She didn’t say anything else, did she? … I usually put it on the top shelf … I forgot this time and put it below,” Liu wrote, according to the complaint.
“I said it was Fusarium. No … She also asked me if you had detected it before. She thought it was Fo’s … I didn’t dare tell her it was Fg … Fortunately I didn’t say it was Fg. That’s even more serious,” Jian wrote, according to the complaint.
Law enforcement believes “Fg” referred to Fusarium graminearum and “Fo” to Fusarium oxysporum, which MPMI does have a permit to study, the documents show.
When Liu arrived as a tourist at the Detroit Metropolitan Airport in July 2024, he allegedly made false statements about, before eventually admitting to, smuggling the pathogen from China to conduct research at the University of Michigan lab with Jian.
Customs officers interviewed Liu, who initially said he did not have any work materials with him, according to court documents. It alleges the officers found a note in Chinese, filter paper, and four small bags of plant material, which Liu initially said must have been put into his bag by someone else.
When questioned, Liu then said the bags were different strains of Fusarium graminearum, according to the court document, and he hid them because he knew there were restrictions on importing these materials. He allegedly said he intended to use the lab at the University of Michigan where his girlfriend Jian also conducts research on the fungus.
An FBI lab test showed that the filter paper also contained 10 different samples of the fungus and could allow a researcher to propagate a live strain, according to the complaint.
FBI agents interviewed Jian about Liu, and Jian said “I don’t study on Fusarium,” according to the complaint.
“I’m going to ask you point blank, and I need you to be honest. Are you assisting his research on Fusarium graminearum in this lab?” an agent asked, according to court documents.
Jian said no but that she did in China, according to the complaint. “In this lab, here?” the agent asked again.
“Fusarium graminearum, no. Fusarium graminearum, 100 percent no,” Jian said, according to the court document.
U.S. Custom and Border Protection (CBP) Director of Field Operations Marty C. Raybon said the charges came after a “complex investigation” by multiple CBP offices. Investigation by CBP and the FBI are ongoing.
The Epoch Times reached out to Jian through her University of Michigan contact but did not receive a response by publication time. The Epoch Times was unable to ascertain if a Zhejiang University contact for Liu was functional.
