TheVat Posted May 15, 2022 Posted May 15, 2022 https://www.science.org/content/article/why-judge-might-overturn-guilty-verdict-against-u-s-scientist-hiding-china-ties Arrested in June 2019, Tao was the first academic scientist prosecuted under the China Initiative, a controversial program begun in 2018 under then-President Donald Trump that was aimed at rooting out economic espionage. However, only two of some two dozen academics charged under the initiative were ever prosecuted for espionage-related offenses; the others were generally charged with failing to disclose ties to Chinese institutions to U.S. funding agencies. U.S. universities once encouraged interactions with Chinese institutions, notes German, a vocal critic of the erstwhile China Initiative, and academics like Hu and Tao were praised for building those links. “Now the FBI is saying that all such collaborations pose serious national security risks,” German says. “But they are conflating the very real threat of economic espionage by China with collaborations on fundamental research that pose no such threat.” More on the background of the case: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/an-uncertain-future-for-a-chinese-scientist-accused-of-espionage More in-depth: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/03/21/have-chinese-spies-infiltrated-american-campuses This all seems like the kind of racialized Trumpist panic that kills good science and drives away the most talented. The DOJ, in all the stories I've read, seems to have a lot of agents who have little understanding of how fundamental science works, or that normal collegial exchange of information is not "theft." I'm glad the China Initiative was cancelled, but they need to bring all those misbegotten prosecutions to an end, and focus on real industrial theft and military secrets, not some guy in Kansas tinkering with ambient-pressure X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy for possible future use in clean energy. This is basic research that thrives on international cooperation and the free flow of research data.
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