[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                      EXPOSING THE DANGERS OF THE
                    INFLUENCE OF FOREIGN ADVERSARIES
                          ON COLLEGE CAMPUSES

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

       SUBCOMMITTEE ON HIGHER EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT

                                 OF THE

                COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND THE WORKFORCE
                     U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                             FIRST SESSION

                               __________



             HEARING HELD IN WASHINGTON, DC, JULY 13, 2023

                               __________

                           Serial No. 118-17

                               __________

  Printed for the use of the Committee on Education and the Workforce
  
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        Available via: edworkforce.house.gov or www.govinfo.gov
        
                              __________

                   U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
53-758 PDF                  WASHINGTON : 2024                    
          
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------             
       
                COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND THE WORKFORCE

               VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina, Chairwoman

JOE WILSON, South Carolina           ROBERT C. ``BOBBY'' SCOTT, 
GLENN THOMPSON, Pennsylvania             Virginia,
TIM WALBERG, Michigan                  Ranking Member
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin            RAUL M. GRIJALVA, Arizona
ELISE M. STEFANIK, New York          JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut
RICK W. ALLEN, Georgia               GREGORIO KILILI CAMACHO SABLAN,
JIM BANKS, Indiana                     Northern Mariana Islands
JAMES COMER, Kentucky                FREDERICA S. WILSON, Florida
LLOYD SMUCKER, Pennsylvania          SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon
BURGESS OWENS, Utah                  MARK TAKANO, California
BOB GOOD, Virginia                   ALMA S. ADAMS, North Carolina
LISA McCLAIN, Michigan               MARK DeSAULNIER, California
MARY MILLER, Illinois                DONALD NORCROSS, New Jersey
MICHELLE STEEL, California           PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington
RON ESTES, Kansas                    SUSAN WILD, Pennsylvania
JULIA LETLOW, Louisiana              LUCY McBATH, Georgia
KEVIN KILEY, California              JAHANA HAYES, Connecticut
AARON BEAN, Florida                  ILHAN OMAR, Minnesota
ERIC BURLISON, Missouri              HALEY M. STEVENS, Michigan
NATHANIEL MORAN, Texas               TERESA LEGER FERNANDEZ, New Mexico
JOHN JAMES, Michigan                 KATHY MANNING, North Carolina
LORI CHAVEZ-DeREMER, Oregon          FRANK J. MRVAN, Indiana
BRANDON WILLIAMS, New York           JAMAAL BOWMAN, New York
ERIN HOUCHIN, Indiana

                       Cyrus Artz, Staff Director
              Veronique Pluviose, Minority Staff Director
                                 ------                                

       SUBCOMMITTEE ON HIGHER EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT

                     BURGESS, OWENS, UTAH, Chairman

GLENN THOMPSON, Pennsylvania         FREDERICA WILSON, Florida,
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin              Ranking Member
ELISE M. STEFANIK, New York          MARK TAKANO, California
JIM BANKS, Indiana                   PRAMILA, JAYAPAL, Washington
LLOYD SMUCKER, Pennsylvania          TERESA LEGER FERNANDEZ, New Mexico
BOB GOOD, Virginia                   KATHY E. MANNING, North Carolina
NATHANIEL MORAN, Texas               LUCY McBATH, Georgia
JOHN JAMES, Michigan                 RAUL M. GRIJALVA, Arizona
LORI CHAVEZ-DeREMER, Oregon          JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut
ERIN HOUCHIN, Indiana                GREGORIO KILILI CAMACHO SABLAN,
BRANDON WILLIAMS, New York             Northern Mariana Islands
VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina        SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon
                                     ALMA ADAMS, North Carolina
                         
                         C  O  N  T  E  N  T  S

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page

Hearing held on July 13, 2023....................................     1

                           OPENING STATEMENTS

    Owens, Hon. Burgess, Chairman, Subcommittee on Higher 
      Education and Workforce Development........................     1
        Prepared statement of....................................     5
    Wilson, Hon. Frederica, Ranking Member, Subcommittee on 
      Higher Education and Workforce Development.................     8
        Prepared statement of....................................    10

                               WITNESSES

    Moore, Paul R., Senior Counsel, Defense of Freedom Institute.    11
        Prepared statement of....................................    14
    Yang, John C., President and Executive Director, Asian 
      Americans Advancing Justice--AAJC..........................    22
        Prepared statement of....................................    24
    Singleton, Craig, China Program Deputy Director and Senior 
      Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies..............    36
        Prepared statement of....................................    38

                         ADDITIONAL SUBMISSIONS

    Takano, Hon. Mark, a Representative in Congress from the 
      State of California:
        Article dated April 15, 2020, from Politico..............    58
    Jayapal, Hon. Pramila, a Representative in Congress from the 
      State of Washington:
        Article dated January 18, 2023 from The Daily 
          Pennsylvanian..........................................    76

 
                      EXPOSING THE DANGERS OF THE
                    INFLUENCE OF FOREIGN ADVERSARIES
                          ON COLLEGE CAMPUSES

                              ----------                              


                        Thursday, July 13, 2023

                  House of Representatives,
    Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce 
                                       Development,
                  Committee on Education and the Workforce,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:16 a.m., 
Rayburn House Office Building, Room 2175, Hon. Burgess Owens 
[Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Owens, Thompson, Grothman, Banks, 
Good, Moran, James, Foxx, Wilson, Takano, Jayapal, Manning, 
Courtney, Sablan, Bonamici, Adams, and Scott.
    Staff present: Cyrus Artz, Staff Director; Mindy Barry, 
General Counsel; Hans Bjontegard, Legislative Assistant; 
Solomon Chen, Professional Staff Member; Isabel Foster, Press 
Assistant; Daniel Fuenzalida, Staff Assistant; Sheila Havenner, 
Director of Information Technology; Meghan Heckelman, Intern; 
Claire Houchin, Intern; Amy Raaf Jones, Director of Education 
and Human Services Policy; Hannah Matesic, Deputy Staff 
Director; Audra McGeorge, Communications Director; Gabriella 
Pistone, Legislative Assistant Oversight; Rebecca Powell, Staff 
Assistant; Mary Christina Riley, Professional Staff Member; 
Chance Russell, Professional Staff Member; Kent Talbert, 
Investigative Counsel; Brad Thomas, Senior Education Policy 
Advisor; Sapna Rampersaud, Legal Intern; Savoy Adams, Minority 
Intern; Brittany Alston, Minority Operations Assistant; Amaris 
Benavidez, Minority Professional Staff; Rashage Green, Minority 
Director of Education Policy & Counsel; Christian Haines, 
Minority General Counsel; Kristion Jackson, Minority Intern; 
Emanual Kimble, Minority Fellow; Stephanie Lalle, Minority 
Communications Director; Raiyana Malone, Minority Press 
Secretary; Kota Mizutani, Minority Deputy Communication 
Director; Veronique Pluviose, Minority Staff Director; Banyon 
Vassar, Minority IT Administrator.
    Chairman Owens. The Subcommittee on Higher Education and 
Workforce Development will come to order. I note there is a 
quorum present. Without objection, the Chair is recognized to 
call a recess at any time. Today's hearing addresses the 
growing threat of foreign influence in American Education.
    The father of this Nation, George Washington, was acutely 
aware of this threat, and has offered sage advice to future 
generations upon leaving office. In his farewell address 
Washington warned history and experience prove that foreign 
influence is one of the most painful foes of Republican 
government.
    In the year 2023, Washington would look upon the foreign 
entanglements with disfavor and disappointment. China, and 
other foreign adversaries are determined to undermine America's 
national interest and affect our political discourse. The 
modern battleground now includes college universities, 
campuses, and now student's young minds.
    In April, I took to the floor to condemn the foreign 
influence in our post-secondary academic institutions. I said 
then what I will repeat today. The manipulation of our children 
on America soil, paid for by American taxpayer is unacceptable. 
For those who facilitate and undermine our institutions, it is 
traitorous. We are now in an era with too many American college 
and university administrators, due to financial incentives or 
bribes, from adversarial regimes, choose to allow 
indoctrination on our American campuses.
    I call it profitable patriotism. Adversaries, monarchs, 
bureaucracies, dictatorships, and anti-American Chinese 
Communist party pay for influence in our universities through 
foreign gifts and funding. It is the height of disloyalty. If 
the Biden administration will do nothing about it, we have a 
Republican party in Congress, I promise we will.
    Under Section 117 the Higher Education Act, colleges and 
universities must, and must is not an option. Must disclose any 
foreign funding to their institutions exceeding $225,000.00. In 
2019, the Senate report found 70 percent of colleges choose to 
skirt, hide, and cheat, so as not to be compliant with this 
law.
    We are now at a time when only 30 percent of the college 
administrations overseeing our educational institutions gain it 
important to follow a law put in place by Congress with 
oversight authority. To make matters worse, the Trump 
administration found 6.5 billion dollars in previously 
undisclosed foreign funds.
    Once again, profit over patriotism, profit over love of 
country, and profit over love of freedom. Our adversaries, and 
America's enemies, some guilty of absolutely the worst human 
right abuses, did not pay these dollars to educational 
institutions because of some pie in the sky wish of 
humanitarian goodness.
    No, these dollars come with strings attached, which are 
then used to leverage against American faculty and students. 
Meanwhile, the American taxpayer is left supporting 
institutions that sacrifice our national values, our freedom 
and our future for money. For example, foreign funds are used 
to set up State backed cultural exchange centers that operate 
as cultural indoctrination centers.
    China, for instance, donates money to American universities 
to fund Confucius institutions, renown campus hubs known for 
pushing propaganda like the denial of the Tenement Square 
massacre. These institutions also monitor and threaten Chinese 
international students here in the United States if they speak 
out against the CCP.
    Political pressure has caused many of these institutions to 
close on paper, but in reality, they simply evolve and rebrand 
under a different name. These problematic relationships still 
pose a direct threat to students and academic freedom. 
Moreover, the foreign funding creates inroads for intellectual 
property theft.
    In this arena again, China posed a serious threat for our 
80 percent of economic espionage crimes are prosecuted by the 
Department of Justice are committed by Communist Chinese 
actors. The theft of trade secrets costs Americans an estimated 
600 billion dollars annually.
    How many of these American universities are inadvertently 
sponsoring CCP backed espionage? There are 70 percent--70 
percent of college administrators who are not compliant, opting 
not to be transparent to congressional oversight. Far too long, 
educational institutions have reaped financial benefits while 
our enemies have undermined our culture.
    Ultimately, too many of these college administrators feel 
they are above the accountability and oversight. What else can 
we conclude other than there is a systemic sense of arrogance 
within these institutions. Once again, 6.5 billion dollars 
funneled in secrecy, undisclosed foreign finances to 70 percent 
of American institutions and learning.
    For a regime that is anti-capitalist, the CCP seems to have 
found a remarkable return on investment in our taxpayer funded 
colleges and universities. It is time we take these foreign 
threats seriously, beginning with foreign influence on 
America's campuses. We should disentangle from China, as 
Washington would have preferred, but requires--this requires a 
serious executive.
    The Biden administration does not seem to get it. Recently, 
Secretary Janet Yellen called the coupling from China a big 
mistake. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan echoed her a 
week later. Biden's reckless Department of Education has yet to 
open up one single section 117 investigation.
    Department talks on both sides of his mouth on this 
particular issue. Their department blames Congress, saying that 
they are overwhelmed and lack funding. And yet the DOE 
transferred this authority to investigate these violations from 
a well-equipped Office of General Counsel to an underwater FSA.
    The FSA is ill suited for enforcement that online portal to 
report these violations were broken for months, with no 
communication. We also have no indication the Department is 
conducting substantial reviews of any submitted disclosures. 
For those who are curious, what is the FSA? The Federal student 
aid. What do the student loans have to do with the CCP 
infiltrating, bribing our institutions and stealing our 
intellectual properties? Absolutely nothing.
    It is a total sham that the Department of Education thinks 
they did away with this, and I think it's pure arrogance. 
Rather than enforce the law, President Biden has cozied up with 
Beijing. Thanks to congressional oversight, we now know that 
the Penn Biden Center received tens of millions of dollars in 
anonymous Chinese funding, and then paid the future President a 
handsome salary of $900,000.00.
    Moreover, we know that the Penn Biden Center employed 10 
future senior administrative offices officials, with salaries 
up to $280,000.00. Does this have anything to do with the 
administration's unwillingness to enforce Section 8, 117? We're 
waiting to see how that works out.
    It appears that the Biden administration has purposely 
chose to turn a blind eye. I can promise you this Committee 
with the Republican majority will not. Freedom can only survive 
with transparency. The next reporting deadline for Section 117 
disclosures is at the end of this month.
    This administration has just under 20 days to ensure that 
the American's colleges and universities, taxpayer funded 
institutions, are not hiding foreign donations from public eye. 
For the sake of our republic, and the millions of taxpaying 
Americans, we look for full transparency from these 
institutions.
    With that, I yield to the Ranking Member for her opening 
statement.
    [The statement of Chairman Owens follows:]
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    Ms. Wilson. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman Owens, and good 
morning. I want to express my gratitude to our witnesses for 
their testimoneys this morning. I would also like to 
acknowledge Dr. Moss, my former educational advisor, and all of 
the students in attendance for today's hearing. Your dedication 
to promoting inclusivity and innovation in our education system 
inspires all of the members of this Committee, so welcome.
    It is so important that this Committee recognizes that we 
are here to serve you, and to address your needs. We are the 
Education Committee. Global collaborations and Federal research 
investments are vital for the investment of our society. 
Through collaboration with global partners and strategic 
Federal investments in research, universities across the world 
have made bold, forward-thinking strides in health, science, 
and technology.
    The benefits of global partnerships undoubtedly help drive 
intellectual and campus diversity while bolstering our economy. 
However, as the Federal Government provides roughly $30 billion 
annually to colleges and universities to support research and 
development efforts, we must ensure that colleges and 
universities are transparent about their ties to foreign 
entities.
    Section 117 of the Higher Education Act requires the 
Department of Education to collect and publicly disclose 
certain information about foreign gifts and contracts involving 
institutions of higher education. This crucial process aims to 
promote public transparency regarding the role of foreign 
funding on higher education, and safeguard government funded 
activities against undue, foreign influence.
    Unfortunately, I fear that my Republican colleagues have 
over-emphasized enforcement, rather than providing guidance 
regarding Section 117. The lack of clear guidance hinders 
institutions' ability to comply with the law effectively. We 
should focus on streamlining the oversight mechanisms in place 
to ensure Section 117 compliance.
    It should provide clear guidance for institutions to engage 
in international collaboration. Finally, it would be so 
careless if we did not remind my Republican colleagues that 
asking for accountability and compliance in this hearing can 
occur without scapegoating our Asian American community.
    When discussing foreign influence on campus it is 
imperative that we do not fuel prevailing anti-Asian 
sentiments. Congress, and this administration, have raised 
valid concerns regarding the Chinese Communist Party, and their 
agenda against the United States.
    These worries should not be twisted into an excuse to push 
anti-Asian rhetoric, and we must safeguard our interest without 
adopting an extreme isolationist position. Thank you, and I 
yield back, Mr. Chair.
    [The statement of Ranking Member Wilson follows:]
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    Chairman Owens. Thank you, Ms. Wilson. Pursuant to 
Committee Rule 8(c), all members who wish to insert written 
statements into the record may do so by submitting them to the 
Committee Clerk electronically by Microsoft Word format by 5 
p.m., 14 days after the date of this hearing, which is July 27, 
2023.
    Without objection, the hearing record will remain open 14 
days to allow such statements and other materials referenced 
during this hearing to be submitted for the official hearing 
record. I now turn to the introduction of our three 
distinguished witnesses.
    The first witness is Mr. Paul Moore, who is a Senior 
Counsel for the Defense of Freedom Institution, which is 
located here in Washington, DC. Our second witness is John C. 
Yang, who is President and Executive Director of Asian 
Americans Advancing Justice, which is also located here in 
Washington, DC.
    Our final witness is Craig Singleton, who is the China 
Program Public Deputy Director and Senior Fellow at the 
Foundation of Defense of Democracies, which again is here in 
Washington, DC. Thank you so much for you guys being here.
    I want to thank the witnesses for being here today and look 
forward to your testimony. Pursuant to Committee rules, I would 
ask that you each limit your oral presentation to a 5-minute 
summary of your written statement. I would also like to remind 
the witnesses to be aware of their responsibility to provide 
accurate information to the Subcommittee. I want to first 
recognize Mr. Moore.

   STATEMENT OF PAUL MOORE, J.D., SENIOR COUNSEL, DEFENSE OF 
              FREEDOM INSTITUTE, WASHINGTON, D.C.

    Mr. Moore. Good morning, Chairman Owens, Ranking Member 
Wilson, and members of the Committee. My name is Paul Moore. I 
am Senior Counsel of the Defense of Freedom Institute for 
Policy Studies, and I previously served as Chief Investigative 
Counsel for the U.S. Department of Education and as an 
Assistant U.S. Attorney and in other roles of the Department of 
Justice.
    As Chief Investigative Counsel, much of my role involved 
investigating compliance by America's colleges and universities 
with Section 117, the statutory requirement that America's 
colleges and universities timely report qualifying foreign 
gifts and contracts to the Department.
    Section 117 reporting requirements are not complicated or 
burdensome, they merely require the universities accurately and 
timely report those foreign gifts and contracts valued at 
$250,000.00 or more to the Department twice a year. 
Unfortunately, the Department's enforcement efforts have 
historically been very uneven. For example, in 2004, the 
Department began permitting institutions to provide donor 
anonymity when reporting foreign gifts and contracts.
    This practice called anonymizing directly undermined 
congressional intent that foreign donor identities be revealed. 
This led to a dramatic increase in the flow of foreign money to 
higher education, beginning around 2009, particularly from 
China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and other countries.
    Many of our great universities have since become addicted 
to that foreign money. In April 2011, the FBI issued a white 
paper warning that foreign adversaries seek to take advantage 
of America's higher education research enterprise to gain 
military and economic advantages over the United States.
    In February 2019, the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on 
Investigations issued a bipartisan report warning that foreign 
government spending at U.S. schools is effectively a black hole 
because up to 70 percent of all colleges and universities were 
failing to report foreign gifts and contracts.
    This began to change in November 2019, when at the 
Direction of Secretary Betsy DeVos, the Department's Office of 
the General Counsel initiated multiple civil investigations of 
non-compliance by some of America's leading universities. The 
Department found that Section 117 reporting had been generally 
under inclusive and inaccurate, and found that many colleges 
and universities even appeared to conceal foreign funding.
    These compliance failures occurred despite those same 
colleges and universities having extremely sophisticated 
foreign financial tracking capabilities. In October 2020, the 
Department published a report revealing that its enforcement 
efforts had resulted in disclosure of more than 200, excuse me, 
6.5 billion dollars in previously undisclosed foreign gifts and 
contracts. The report revealed that historically fewer than 300 
of the approximately 6,000 U.S. higher educational institutions 
actually self-report foreign money each year as required by 
Section 117. The Department found that foreign adversaries are 
likely targeting specific institutions for their research and 
development technologies.
    In April 2021 testimony before the Senate Select Committee 
on Intelligence, FBI Director Wray warned that China presents a 
severe threat to our academic institutions. Despite these clear 
threats and warnings, the Biden Administration's Section 117 
enforcement efforts have taken a very different direction.
    The Department now appears to have largely ceded control 
over its Section 117 enforcement policies to a higher education 
industry group known as the American Council on Education, or 
ACE, which has long objected to nearly any serious efforts by 
the Department to enforce Section 117.
    This puts America's national security at risk. Since 
January 2021, reporting foreign gifts and contracts by 
universities has declined dramatically even as the threat to 
America has increased. In August 2022, ACE's Senior Vice 
President announced the Department's closure of its remaining 
Section 117 investigations, and that Section 117 management 
would be transferred back to Federal student aid.
    Normally, such a significant announcement should have come 
from the Department, not higher education's chief lobbyist. FSA 
is unsuited to the Section 117 enforcement task, which may 
explain why the Department has chosen to shift Section 117 
enforcement responsibilities to FSA.
    Section 117 is a very simple, straightforward statutory 
disclosure requirement that the Department is required to 
enforce. To do so, it should immediately return enforcement 
responsibilities to the Office of the General Counsel. Congress 
should ban the practice of anonymizing donors and Section 117 
disclosures.
    Congress should tie Section 117 compliance by America's 
colleges and universities with their eligibility to participate 
in Title 4 Federal Student Loan Grant and Work Study Programs. 
Congress may wish to require that prominent college and 
university administrators certify under oath the accuracy and 
completeness of their Sections 117 disclosures to the 
Department.
    The American people generously fund significant portions of 
the operations in most of our colleges and universities and 
deserve awareness enforcement efforts by the Department. Thank 
you for the opportunity to appear before you. I look forward to 
answering any questions you may have.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Moore follows:]
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    Chairman Owens. Thank you, Mr. Moore. I would like to next 
recognize Mr. Yang.

    STATEMENT OF MR. JOHN C. YANG, PRESIDENT AND EXECUTIVE 
 DIRECTOR, ASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE, WASHINGTON, D.C.

    Mr. Yang. Thank you, Chairman Owens, Ranking Member Wilson, 
and the other members of this Committee. My name is John C. 
Yang. I am the President and Executive Director of Asian 
Americans Advancing Justice, AAJC, based in Washington, DC. I 
previously served in the Department of Commerce, as well as 
Shanghai-based legal director for the American company of 
Illinois Tool Works.
    Look, the American university system is the enemy of the 
world, and the United States has benefited from the talent that 
has come to the United States. Many of the most significant, 
scientific advances have come from immigrants such as Enrico 
Fermi, and such as Albert Einstein.
    Let us also remember that many of the scientists and 
students that we are talking about today chose to come here 
because of the Democratic ideals that we represent, and because 
they prefer our system of government rather than Communist and 
autocratic systems. We should be embracing that community, 
learning from this community, and celebrating that they chose 
to be here, and to contribute to our American democracy.
    Unfortunately, xenophobic and anti-immigrant and racist 
rhetoric used by policymakers and officials at the highest 
level of our government fueled resurgent xenophobia against 
immigrants, especially of Chinese and Asian descent.
    One need not look further than the recent attacks against 
Congresswoman Judy Chu, whose loyalty to the United States was 
questioned simply because of her race and ethnicity. Public and 
government officials must be cautious of engaging in anti-
Chinese rhetoric and must challenge colleagues and peers who do 
so. The cost of the Asian American community is clear.
    Surveys by Pew and the Asian American Foundation 
demonstrate that one in two Asian Americans no longer feel safe 
because of their race and ethnicity, and shockingly, one in 
four Americans believe that Asian Americans are somehow more 
loyal to their country ethnicity rather than the United States. 
That narrative has to change.
    There is currently a widespread suspicion of scientists, 
university researchers and students who are Chinese or of Asian 
descent. Then President Trump in 2018 wildly and irresponsibly 
stated that ``Almost every student that comes over to this 
country from China is a spy.''
    As another example, the now abandoned China initiative 
created a mandate and increased pressure on the FBI to 
scrutinize and target Asian Americans and Asian immigrants in 
the research community, based seemingly only on their 
ethnicity, rather than criminal activity. Indeed, FBI Director 
Wray suggested that there should be a case opened at every 
single U.S. Attorney's district on the China initiative.
    This led to the prosecution of many Asian Americans and 
immigrants for conduct that is minor, unrelated to espionage, 
and typically would not support criminal prosecution. Several 
cases over the last 2 years demonstrate that this approach was 
flawed, leading to dismissals and acquittals in cases like Gang 
Chen, Anming Hu, and Franklin Tao.
    Fortunately, the administration looked at this initiative, 
recognized that it is wrong headed, and decided to abandon that 
approach. These entailments and investigations have led to the 
dismissal, resignation and termination of Asian American 
scientists, as well as a growing fear among Asian Americans and 
Asian immigrants of being targeted and scapegoated based on 
their race, ethnicity and national origin.
    Look, to be clear we do have legitimate differences with 
the Chinese government and the Xi Jinping regime presents a 
unique national security challenge. If we are not careful, and 
we do not use the proper language and engage in the proper 
nuance about these policies and actions, there are communities 
that will suffer.
    I am not theorizing about this here. We saw the 
incarceration of Americans of Japanese descent based on 
fictionalized evidence of espionage. We saw the murder of Sikh 
Americans, and hate crimes against the Arab, Middle East, and 
Muslim and South Asian American community after 9/11. We saw 
the murder of Vincent Chin because of a trade war with Japan 
that we had in the early 1980's.
    Look, these are legitimate disputes that we had with these 
foreign nations, and in each of these cases our domestic 
community, our Americans suffered. When approaching these 
issues we need to use a scalpel, not a sledgehammer. We need to 
approach these issues with facts, precision, and expertise, so 
that we can be effective and efficient with our solutions.
    We need to define our terms carefully to avoid overreach, 
and to allow universities, professors, and students to 
understand their obligations and to comply. We need to train 
investigators to avoid misunderstandings, stereotyping and 
overreach. Universities have been perfect places to facilitate 
effective, long-standing, meaningful intellectual exchanges.
    Those exchanges bring so many different benefits that are 
critical to helping individuals understand each other, their 
culture and their shared humanity. Open research and 
collaboration is critical to addressing some of our world's 
most difficult problems, such as climate change and technology.
    I ask that all of us avoid Jingoism to avoid stereotyping. 
Let us engage in a thoughtful, specific discussion necessary to 
celebrate the strength of the American education system, while 
recognizing the challenges that we face. Thank you very much.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Yang follows:]
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    Chairman Owens. Thank you, Mr. Yang. I would like now--I 
would like to recognize Mr. Singleton.

STATEMENT OF MR. CRAIG SINGLETON, CHINA PROGRAM DEPUTY DIRECTOR 
   AND SENIOR FELLOW, FOUNDATION FOR DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES, 
                        WASHINGTON, D.C.

    Mr. Singleton. Chairman Owens, Ranking Member Wilson, and 
distinguished members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for the 
opportunity to testify about foreign adversary influence on 
U.S. college campuses. I am pleased to provide relevant 
research and policy insights from the Foundation for Defense of 
Democracies, a non-partisan research institution where I serve 
as a senior fellow.
    Foreign adversary nations are engaged in far-reaching 
campaigns to exploit the United States's open, collaborative 
nature and furtherance of their strategic military and economic 
goals. Nowhere is this threat more acute than on U.S. college 
campuses today. These complicated challenges extend well beyond 
technology transfer and intellectual property theft.
    Increasingly, America's adversaries, but particularly 
China, are leveraging their almost unfettered access to U.S. 
universities to stifle free speech protections, monitor student 
activities, and promote false narratives. No doubt, openness, 
freedom and diversity represent fundamental pillars of our 
democracy, and serve as intrinsic strength on the United States 
and our way of life.
    Maintaining America's competitive edge hinges on a 
commitment to open academic and scientific exchange, but so too 
must we embrace common sense measures to protect our 
intellectual capital and discourage its misappropriation, as 
well as to counter authoritarian attempts to promote on campus 
censorship and intimidation.
    In doing so, we must take serious steps to avoid inflaming 
anti-Asian rhetoric for the unjustly blaming of Chinese 
students as spies. Indeed, by encouraging dialog, and 
respectful engagement, Congress stands to promote a clear-eyed 
understanding of the complex geo-political issues at play, 
while still respecting diverse perspectives.
    Responding to this evolving threat requires the 
establishment of new legislative and regulatory guardrails 
centered around enhanced transparency requirements, mandatory 
due diligence and vetting protocols, and in some cases funding 
and gift prohibitions to protect academic freedom and 
integrity.
    Some of those measures should include a Federal ban on 
Confucius institutes, and their rebranded successors, which are 
proliferating across college campuses, lowering Section 117's 
foreign gift reporting threshold from $250,000.00 to $5,000.00, 
and empowering the U.S. Department of Education to better 
investigate and enforce Section 117 non-compliance, mandating 
that U.S. universities make publicly available details 
regarding all academic and research partnership agreements, 
both active and inactive, with entities located in countries of 
concern, such as China.
    Establishing formal mechanisms so the Department of 
Education in coordination with other agencies to share relevant 
insight, best practices and trends with select foreign 
partners, similarly working to confront maligned, adversarial 
influence throughout their higher education systems.
    We should not view these new measures as limitations on 
academic freedom, but rather as necessary safeguards to 
preserve the integrity of our higher education system. 
Transparency and oversight do not stifle collaboration, but 
instead ensure that partnerships are built on a foundation of 
trust, accountability, and shared values.
    Moreover, by better scrutinizing financial ties, 
legislators can prevent undue influence, and ensure that 
research and educational activities remain independent and free 
from adversarial pressure. On these issues, policymakers here 
in Washington stand to learn from leaders of the State level, 
including in places like Florida.
    This year Democrats and Republicans in Tallahassee, working 
closely with university representatives, and higher education 
stakeholders unanimously passed the first of its kind 
legislation, enhancing transparency requirements, foreign 
influence disclosure rules, and targeted to gift bans to 
protect the state's post-secondary institutions and their 
students from the evolving threat posed by adversarial 
countries of concern.
    These, and other State level initiatives can and should 
serve as models for Federal level legislation. No doubt, 
efforts to neutralize the threat facing by China, Russia, and 
other adversarial nations transcends political lines, even as 
they present a myriad of cross-jurisdictional challenges in 
Congress.
    Legislators must therefore work together to leverage their 
diverse backgrounds and experiences across congressional 
committees, to effectively tackle this issue, and produce 
lasting legislative outcomes. On behalf of the Foundation for 
Defense of Democracies I thank you again for inviting me to 
testify today.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Singleton follows:]
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    Chairman Owens. Thank you, Mr. Singleton, appreciate that. 
Okay. Under Committee Rule Number 9, we will now question the 
witnesses under the 5-minute rule. I will begin the process. 
Mr. Moore, one excuse we hear from schools is that tracking 
foreign funds seems to be too difficult. Hearing how well 
universities seem to track athletic booster contributions, or 
which students without outstanding tuition and fees are due, we 
find that response somewhat hard to believe.
    During your investigations did you find that it was truly 
difficult for schools to identify and track foreign 
contributions?
    Mr. Moore. Mr. Chairman, our investigations found that the 
universities had the information we wanted readily in hand, but 
they were extremely reluctant to provide it to us.
    The idea that it presented an additional burden to them, 
they were already--our investigations revealed that they were 
already very systematically tracking foreign contracts, foreign 
gifts, and of course pursuing donors around the world with 
great vigor as you might expect.
    It was not an issue where the universities would have had 
to have set up new mechanisms. They could simply have made an 
effort to tap the information they were already collecting and 
producing, and provide that accurately to the Department as 
required by Section 117.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. Actually, I am going to ask both 
you and Mr. Singleton this question. I think you kind of 
addressed this somewhat in your opening statement, but I want 
to just make sure we have this.
    We are engaged with the battle against foreign bad actors 
whose goals are to undermine our American culture of freedom. 
It turned our students against a free market system and steal 
our intellectual properties, but there are also domestic actors 
in our educational system willing to grant these foreign actors 
safe harbor on our college campuses.
    What suggestions--I think you highlighted some of these 
things before, would you say to hold these domestic actors 
accountable when the Department of Education refuses to take 
action?
    Mr. Moore. Well, I think that the Office for Civil Rights 
at the Department of Education ought to be very cognizant of 
pressure from the Chinese Communist Party that's applied in the 
United States to students particularly of Chinese descent. 
That's a big issue, and an ongoing issue.
    It has been an issue at Fordham and other universities, and 
frankly the university, excuse me, the Department ought to be 
extremely aware, and ought to have a way to facilitate 
investigations of that sort of pressure from entities acting on 
behalf of the CCP.
    Chairman Owens. Mr. Singleton, do you have any suggestions 
on that also?
    Mr. Singleton. Sure. I mean collaboration is vital, but 
China has proven adept at exploiting America's academic 
openness and dynamism to advance its intertwined industrial 
policies and military expansion. Passing legislation to prevent 
potential conflicts of interest on campus is essential, hiking 
student screening, and in some cases outright denials for 
individuals in certain state-run institutions in China's 
military.
    In particular, holding hearings like this, but establishing 
Federal Government office, and American State and local 
governments and non-governmental organizations can approach for 
advice on how to best manage some of these requests, and how to 
manage and learn from the experiences of other universities 
across the country.
    Chairman Owens. Okay. Thank you. Mr. Singleton, now one of 
the loopholes we have seen abused is the 501(c)(3) system to 
circumvent their foreign rules. Foreign regimes can prop up 
non-profits, use them to funnel money to college campuses. On 
the other side, colleges will sometimes see foreign donations 
through an affiliated university foundation, and then not 
report those contributions. Can these loopholes be addressed?
    Mr. Singleton. Absolutely. I mean non-profits and mirky 
corporate donations are a big threat, and so are gifts and 
donations from State backed, or state-owned companies, and 
state-owned enterprises in China, not to mention individuals 
acting as cut-outs for authoritarian regimes.
    The current law only requires disclosure if the donor is a 
foreign government. This is a loophole that invites 
authoritarian governments to make gifts through third parties, 
and the CCP, the Chinese Communist Party uses third-party 
intermediaries for these types of operations, including 
espionage efforts. That is why they documented it. It is a 
staple of their political and economic force abroad. Increased 
transparency is the answer.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I am going to now recognize the 
Ranking Member for purposes of questioning the witnesses.
    Ms. Wilson. Thank you, Mr. Chair. This question is for you, 
Mr. Yang. In 1960, America's Federal funding represented 45 
percent of all global research and development funding across 
the world. Today, that funding is only 10 percent of global 
funding. Why is Federal funding of research important? What can 
the Federal Government do to continue supporting that research?
    Mr. Yang. Thank you very much for that question. Federal 
funding is critical to advance in all of the fields that we are 
talking about. Let us be clear. The vast majority of the 
funding goes to open research. Open research leads to the 
discoveries that we see, whether it is in science, whether it 
is mathematics, whether it is even in literature or history.
    If we are trying to really advance the American system, we 
need to continue that open and collaborative process. I agree 
that transparency is necessary, but we need to make sure that 
transparency is narrowly tailored to the issues at hand. Make 
sure that our universities are able to comply in a simple 
manner.
    The other thing that I am concerned about is as we are 
moving along in this, if we are going to be changing standards, 
we need to make sure not to have retroactive application of 
those standards so that universities or individuals get caught 
up in the process.
    Ms. Wilson. Thank you. Can you discuss the economic and 
social value of bringing in scholars from across the globe into 
the American higher education system?
    Mr. Yang. Thank you very much. Certainly, there is a huge 
economic value in the neighborhood of tens of billions of 
dollars that goes into our U.S. economy from international 
students as whole. Then beyond that is the soft value that we 
have of introducing them to our American system.
    I am challenged, and I would posit that our universities 
are still succeeding in that. Frankly, if anything, the numbers 
tell us that the sentiment against Asian Americans, Chinese 
Americans, is at an all-time low. To the extent that propaganda 
is trying to cause American students to look against the United 
States, or look toward China, that propaganda is failing.
    The fact that one in four Americans believe that Asian 
Americans hold a dual loyalty is very problematic, and so we 
must continue to encourage those cultural exchanges, so that 
the next generation beyond us can find ways to find the common 
humanity in all of us.
    Ms. Wilson. Can you tell us what impact does harmful 
rhetoric and misinformation have on collaborations with 
international educational institutions?
    Mr. Yang. Literally, my organization and sister 
organizations of ours hear almost every day about professors 
and students that are no longer willing to come to the United 
States. These are professors and students that have so much to 
offer to our country. Again, I am not even necessarily talking 
about sensitive areas, like nuclear secrets, or military 
industrial complex issues, but basic collaboration that is 
being lost.
    They are going to other countries. If we are talking about 
a potential brain drain to this country, that is something that 
we have to solve as well.
    Ms. Wilson. Thank you. Mr. Moore, in my home State of 
Florida the University of Florida's agroecology program 
partners with several international schools including the 
Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
    These research partnerships are crucial to promoting 
mutually beneficial research at higher education institutions, 
but the calls in your testimony to increase enforcement of 
Section 117 has the potential to foster a hostile environment 
for future international research.
    Can you please explain to this Committee how these 
draconian enforcement measures will not discourage 
collaboration with international research partners?
    Mr. Moore. Thank you, Congresswoman. I think Section 117, 
and anything that I have mentioned today to strengthen it 
would--it is simply again, disclosure. It would not do anything 
to inhibit money from China, money from Israel, money from 
anywhere. Those relationships can continue. Contracts can 
continue, new ones can be made. Billions of dollars can 
continue to come in.
    There is no limitation on that in anything that I have 
said, or anything that Section 117 currently says. It simply 
has to be disclosed. My view is that the American people are 
entitled to that information, and policymakers should be 
informed by that information too.
    That should not be any kind of threat to collaborations if 
there is a nefarious donor, or collaborator, and it scares off 
that collaboration, then I think that is probably a very good 
thing. In the case that you mentioned, I do not think that 
would be an issue. Thank you.
    Ms. Wilson. I yield back, thank you.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would now like to recognize 
Mr. Takano.
    Mr. Takano. Yes. Mr. Chairman, I just would like to begin 
with a bit of a pushback on some of your opening comments in 
regards to the statements you made about Biden, and he just 
does not get it. We have heard that you all believe that the 
Department of Education is lax in its enforcement of Section 
117.
    In reality, though it is the Department's most recent data 
and contains tens of thousands of entries from hundreds of 
colleges and universities. It seems to me that the Department 
is communicating with colleges and universities about how 
important it is to report any grants and contracts from foreign 
sources.
    In addition, colleges and universities have gotten the 
message that they are making great strides in reporting this 
information in accordance with the law. While the prior 
administration was focused on a few bad actors, this 
administration is providing guidance and support to colleges 
and universities to help ensure compliance with the law, which 
is what everyone wants.
    Mr. Moore, you said in your testimony you cited a 
bipartisan Senate report that 70 percent of all colleges in 
U.S.--of all U.S. colleges and universities failed to report. 
Do you still believe that to be true?
    Mr. Moore. Congressman, that was according to the report 
from that we----
    Mr. Takano. You just are repeating a report that was issued 
in 2017?
    Mr. Moore. That was in 2020.
    Mr. Takano. 2020.
    Mr. Moore. October 2020.
    Mr. Takano. 2020.
    Mr. Moore. I do not know what the current figures are. I do 
not have access to them.
    Mr. Takano. Okay. In fact, that number could be misleading. 
It could not be accurate. It might not be accurate right now.
    Mr. Moore. I cited the data in my testimony, but it may 
have changed, absolutely.
    Mr. Takano. It could be changed. That 70 percent, is that 
just in reference to reporting on, you know, grants and 
contributions from China, or might other authoritarian nations 
also be a part of a concern of ours?
    Mr. Moore. Many, Congressman. You are right to mention 
that, and I mentioned in my testimony Russia, Qatar, Saudi 
Arabia, there are many nations. This is not an Asian focus, or 
a China focus concern. This is all the world.
    Mr. Takano. Might it be productive for us to have a 
hearing, not just on China, but on the influence of all 
maligned potential nations out there that are authoritarian and 
might have an interest in influencing our universities?
    Mr. Moore. I think that is a wonderful idea, Congressman.
    Mr. Takano. Great. Mr. Singleton, is this third-party 
entity loophole only a problem for China, or do other nations 
potentially contribute or find ways to get money to 
universities through these mechanisms of third parties?
    Mr. Singleton. Sure. I mean friends and foes alike take 
advantage of those sorts of loopholes, which is why we should 
apply the standard evenly across.
    Mr. Takano. I am curious about this sole focus on China of 
this hearing when we have other authoritarian nations that pose 
these issues. Mind you, I am concerned about China's 
authoritarianism, but I am also concerned about 
authoritarianism in general.
    I am going to suspect that it has something to do with how 
the previous administration dealt with China, and I think in a 
very clumsy way. Mr. Chairman, I would seek unanimous consent 
to enter into the record a political article entitled, 15 Times 
Trump Praised China as Coronavirus was Spreading Across the 
Globe.
    Just to give you a flavor, there are 15 entries here from 
January 22 through February when the virus was clearly a posing 
problem, but under appreciated by the President then.
    He says one of the great many things about our just-signed 
giant trade deal with China is that it will bring both USA and 
China closer together in so many ways. Terrific working with 
President Xi, a man who truly loves his country. More to come.
    January 24th, China has been working very hard to contain 
the virus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts 
in transparency. It will all work out well. It goes on and on 
and on. Mr. Chairman, I would like to enter this into the 
record.
    Chairman Owens. No objection.
    [The information of Mr. Takano follows:]
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    Mr. Takano. Several months later, when it was not going so 
well in the United States to manage it, he starts saying things 
like Kung Flu, the China virus, which tremendous boomerang 
effects on Asian Americans because as an Asian American, I know 
what it feels like when one of the Asian ethnicities is singled 
out for scapegoating.
    Then there is a generalized hatred that spreads throughout 
all Asian Americans. Mr. Chairman, I just wanted to make that 
point. I yield back.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you so much. I just want to make sure 
we also clarify that the hearing is really about the 
infiltration of bad actors throughout college systems, and also 
the transparency for funding of that, so kind of have to be one 
of them, but there are others, and we are going to make sure we 
address them all. I would like to have Mr. Good, please.
    Mr. Good. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First, a couple of 
questions would be for Mr. Moore here. Mr. Moore, the 
University of Pennsylvania, you know where this is going, which 
runs the Penn Biden Center in Washington, DC. reportedly 
received 14 million from unnamed contributors in China and Hong 
Kong, and 2.4 million form unnamed contributors in Saudi 
Arabia. There is another country, Saudi Arabia since 2021.
    The names of these donors are concealed by the Department 
of Education, which is required to report donations to 
universities that have funds with Federal dollars, but the 
agency has reportedly declined every request to provide the 
names. Mr. Moore, according to these reports, again the Penn 
Biden Center having received millions of dollars from unnamed 
foreign influence, should the American public be concerned 
about that?
    Mr. Moore. Thank you, Congressman. I think that the 
American public should be very concerned about the undisclosed 
donor identities to UPenn particularly leading up to the 
Presidential election in 2020. It was after the establishment 
of the Biden Center that there was a very dramatic increase, so 
I think reportable gifts and contracts were up 389 percent 
between 2018 and 19.
    Meanwhile, I think 9 of the current administration 
officials were on the payroll of the UPenn Biden Center. 
UPenn--this goes in my opinion to the question of requiring the 
donor identities be made available as part of disclosure. 
Disclosure is somewhat meaningless if the donor identities are 
not provided, so the American people and policymakers can know 
who is giving what to whom.
    UPenn is not alone. There are many other universities with 
similar patterns where it appears that there is an attempt to 
influence policymakers, but this was a rather startling one 
with UPenn. That is why I think that donor identity should be 
disclosed.
    Mr. Good. Just one of the offices where classified 
documents have been found that belong to Mr. Biden, by the way. 
Mr. Singleton, the reports are that 6.5 billion in previously 
unreported foreign money has went to universities from 
adversarial countries--6.5 billion. 8.4 billion anonymously 
reported foreign money over the last decade, 800 billion is the 
total endowment of the market value of the endowment of the 
United States institutions of higher learning, by the way.
    807 billion is the endowment, and yet we have got 1.6 
trillion outstanding student loans with exorbitant increase in 
college tuition. In your testimony you mentioned how university 
endowments are increasingly under foreign influence. Could you 
speak to that a little more, or elaborate on that please?
    Mr. Singleton. Absolutely. Currently there are no 
restrictions whatever on U.S. university endowments from 
investing in Chinese companies that are directly involved in 
Chinese military civil fusion.
    There are numerous examples of endowment funds being 
injected and capitalized into Chinese companies that are 
directly involved in developing advanced technologies that are 
used to propagate the weaker genocide, for example. It is very 
little insight in accountability into how these endowment funds 
are being managed, what is their exposure to China, and 
certainly what linkages and dependencies are created as a 
result of those endowment relationships that do create undue 
burdens and adversarial pressure, not just on the endowment 
funds themselves, but the universities.
    Mr. Good. Why do you think that universities with the 
largest endowments tend to be the worst offenders with 
complying with Section 117, the reporting of the foreign 
donations?
    Mr. Singleton. Well, I would say that you know, the key 
rate is updating and expanding mandatory reporting requirements 
because it will simply conform with the realities that foreign 
influence plays on the university system, including endowments. 
Universities run the risk of entanglement with the Chinese 
Communist Party in large part because they rely on these opaque 
funding and endowment systems from party connected sources that 
includes gifts, donations, investments, Confucius institutes, 
and research partnerships.
    Mr. Good. Staying with you, Mr. Singleton. In one of his 
first national security related acts, President Biden a year 
and a half ago withdrew--or two and a half years ago I should 
say, withdrew a Trump era rule requiring universities to 
disclose their terms of agreements with Confucius institutes, 
which of course act as Chinese Communist Party outposts on 
college campuses. Why do you think he would do that?
    Mr. Singleton. I am not sure.
    Mr. Good. Can you think of any good reason to do that?
    Mr. Singleton. I am not sure. I think it is worth of 
pursuit in terms of investigation and hearing simply because we 
know that Confucius institutes operate as outposts for China's 
united front work department, which plays a key role in its 
political warfare.
    They have also, and there are numerous examples of 
Confucius institutes and their follow-on successors, sometimes 
referred to as Confucius classrooms being harnessed to 
intimidate Asian American students studying here in the United 
States, to control curricula that are used and propagated on 
U.S. college campuses, and to control how research initiatives 
that are developed as a result of these funds.
    I think that while the number of Confucius institutes has 
dropped precipitously from 113 to about 10 today, the problem 
is that we have seen this proliferation of Confucius institute 
like agreements, and frankly no one has been able to sort of 
understand the scale and scope of that problem because there is 
no information.
    Mr. Good. Mr. Singleton, my time has run out. I am getting 
tapped out here, so thank you for your time. I appreciate you 
being here today. I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I now recognize Dr. Adams.
    Ms. Adams. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to our 
Ranking Member as well, and to the witnesses. Thank you for 
your testimony, and Mr. Singleton, as I was listening to you 
talk about the endowments, et cetera, I am not going to ask you 
a question, but if there is data available, I sure would like 
to get copies of it.
    Let me just begin when establishing foreign influence 
compliance that protocol, institutions of higher education have 
to balance compliance and create a welcoming campus climate. I 
am a retired 40-year college professor, so I do have an 
interest in that, but I am pleased at seeing how many 
institutions take this dual responsibility seriously.
    At Florida International University, for example, 
established a university-wide task force on foreign influence 
and global risk. Mr. Yang, can you discuss briefly the value of 
incorporating community stakeholders when developing policies 
around foreign influence and international research 
collaboration?
    Mr. Yang. Thank you for that question. It is absolutely 
vital for the community to be involved. Right now, what we are 
seeing is the community is scared to speak up about issues such 
as this because they feel like they are being targeted, whether 
it is scientists in the university space, whether it is 
students that are thinking about applying to universities here 
in the United States, there is a clear chilling effect that is 
happening because of this rhetoric that is being used.
    I respect what Mr. Singleton is saying, but I must take 
issue a little bit with the focus again on China. It is yes, 
there are issues with respect to transparency, but if we are 
focusing just on what the Chinese government is doing, what the 
Xi Jinping government is doing, then we are missing the forest 
for the trees.
    Yes, we should be talking about transparency. We should 
talk about accountability, but it should be the accountability 
for all countries, all different foreign influence.
    Ms. Adams. Okay. Thank you, sir. Can you discuss best 
practices for engaging within international academics in a way 
that maintains relationships and protects international 
scholars from racial discrimination?
    Mr. Yang. Thank you for that. Part of this is setting clear 
standards, and I see with respect to NSP M33, which was 
promulgated by the OSTP, trying to standardize guidance with 
respect to research grants, what is necessary to be reported. I 
agree with Mr. Moore that Section 117 could be a very useful 
vehicle, but make sure that we have standard forms that should 
be used.
    One thing I would want to be careful about is the 
enforcement mechanism, whether investigators are trained on how 
to investigate these issues, and what the enforcement actually 
is. Too often we have seen Asian American scientists have 
basically paperwork errors turn into criminal prosecutions when 
they should be handled as an administrative matter.
    Ms. Adams. We know that maintaining academic openness and 
collaboration in academia allows us to engage with bright 
individuals from all over the world, and if there are threats 
against national academics, it prevents amazing talents from 
working with our universities.
    Let me ask you, Mr. Yang, in what ways has the Asian 
Americans Advancing Justice worked to combat issues of racial 
discrimination?
    Mr. Yang. While combating racial discrimination as a whole, 
it is really an all effort. First, is making sure that we are 
teaching history in our schoolrooms on Asian American history, 
and making sure that all of the different communities are 
represented, whether they are African American, Latino 
American, LGBTQ Americans.
    Part of this is making sure that everyone is comfortable 
telling their own stories. Part of this is making sure that 
scientists and researchers of students are comfortable talking 
to law enforcement. Even if they make an administrative error 
like Sherrie Chen did, in saying that she had a contact with a 
Chinese person in 2011, rather than 2012.
    That does not become criminalized behavior. Making sure 
that we are specific about how we are engaging with the 
community, consistent engagement, not only from the law 
enforcement end, but from the get-go in terms of creating these 
standards that we're talking about.
    Ms. Adams. Thank you, sir. You mentioned in your testimony 
that MIT, Yale University, Stanford for example, and at least 
eight other institutions have issued statements detailing their 
concerns with the targeting of Chinese scientists, and 
academics. Can you just explain briefly, we just have about 20 
seconds, on the investigations against people of Asian descent 
and how they may affect the number of academics that engage 
with our universities?
    Mr. Yang. For those universities, some of them are afraid 
of hiring them, and some of them are afraid of engaging with 
them and collaborating with them because they fear that they're 
going to have additional burdens imposed upon them, or have 
their behavior be criminalized.
    Ms. Adams. Great. Well, thank you. Mr. Chairman, I am right 
on time. I yield back.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to now recognize 
Mr. Thompson from Pennsylvania.
    Mr. Thompson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for 
holding this important hearing, and thanks to all of our 
witnesses for your testimony. The research and innovation in 
American universities is clearly the envy of the rest of the 
world, and for good reason.
    From developing groundbreaking treatments for cancer, to 
advancements in precision agriculture that help feed the world. 
American institutions of higher education are truly on the 
cutting edge. As the old saying goes, however, with great power 
comes great responsibility.
    The foreign adversaries like China and Russia increasingly 
falling behind in certain sectors, they are looking to steal 
American research and innovation to help make up those losses. 
It is imperative upon all of us to ensure that does not happen. 
Mr. Moore, in your testimony you noted the extensive issues the 
Department of Education has had in processing, investigating, 
and enforcing Section 117 reporting requirements.
    There is an awful lot of data coming into the Department 
under these requirements, and especially given your experience 
as Chief Investigative Counsel at the Department, do you think 
the Department has the capacity to properly process all this 
incoming information?
    Mr. Moore. Thank you, Congressman. I think that is a very 
good question. First, I want to say there are some career folks 
at the Department of Education and the Office of General 
Counsel, particularly that do a superb job in American, that 
can be proud of them. Having said that, most of the Department 
of Education is not suited to review financial records coming 
in from departments, or to engage in the necessary vetting of 
collaborations, or to advise other Federal agencies on those 
fronts.
    I think that it may be something, particularly if the 
department cannot show that it is serious about enforcing the 
Section 117 that Congress may want to look at whether or not 
enforcement of these disclosures needs to go to an agency that 
has actually got America's national security interests as one 
of its tasks, and also has the competency to study financial 
relationships between universities and the documents they 
report, and in our other countries and entities acting on 
behalf of other countries.
    Mr. Thompson. Thank you for that. In your testimony, you 
noted that the Department should immediately return enforcement 
obligations to the Office of General Counsel. How do you 
believe that that would improve enforcement and processing 
capabilities?
    Mr. Moore. In a word, the Office of the General Counsel is 
full of attorneys, and so universities take that a little bit 
more seriously because they have huge staffs, I mean Harvard--
the other universities that we investigated have massive staffs 
full of very able counsel.
    At a minimum, to have moved enforcement to the Federal 
student aid where they do not have attorneys, they are not 
suited for that. They are not armed to do battle with counsel 
for the university, or they will offer them to the university 
it pertains. It is just that universities have no reason to 
take it seriously when they are facing Federal student aid, 
instead of at least the office of the General Counsel.
    Mr. Thompson. Given the current challenges, Mr. Moore, do 
you think expanding reporting requirements would yield any 
different results than the current requirements, or are there 
other ways we can target the kinds of malicious activities 
their adversaries are engaging in, or would it be more 
effective to limit new actions to just countries of concern?
    Mr. Moore. Thank you, Congressman. I think there should be 
heightened concern about the countries that have all but 
declared war against the United States. The CCP certainly is 
one of them, and I think that simply enforcing what is 
currently on the books, particularly with regard to prohibiting 
the anonymizing of donors is critically important because then 
we can at least know who made that 14.8-million-dollar 
contribution, in May 2018 to UPenn from China. Who was that?
    Do they have an interest in the People's Liberation Army, 
or other CCP entities that are very unfriendly to the United 
States. I mean, I think right now it is very important to 
enforce Section 117 as it is and tighten it up. The Department 
could tighten it up tomorrow and say no anonymizing of donors. 
They could do that in a heartbeat if they chose, and I hope 
that Congress can act at least on that.
    Mr. Thompson. Well, thank you. I look forward to working 
with all of you to ensure we protect American innovation and 
keep our competitive edge on the global stage, so I thank you, 
Mr. Chairman, and I yield back.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to now recognize 
Ms. Manning.
    Ms. Manning. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Yang, in the 
1950's Congress participated in a shameful episode known as the 
second Red Scare when fear of foreign Communists infiltrating 
our society and our government resulted in many unfounded 
accusations and prosecutions, but in part, by Republican 
Senator Joseph McCarthy that led to the ruin of countless 
American lives.
    That is a part of our history that kept coming to my mind 
last night as I was reading the briefing materials for today's 
hearings. As we know, we have a long history in this country of 
anti-Asian discrimination, which was exacerbated by the way our 
former President talked about the COVID pandemic and much of 
the China bashing that was normalized by his colleagues, and 
resulted in horrifying attacks on Asian Americans, including 
our highly valued colleague, Congresswoman Judy Chu.
    Mr. Yang, how can we address real risks to our intellectual 
capital and our national security without allowing anti-Asian 
discrimination that should be an anathema to all Americans, and 
is contrary to the fundamental foundations of our democracy.
    Mr. Yang. Thank you very much for that question. Narrative 
is key in the first instance. Once we engage in overblown 
narrative that results in bad policies. As one example would be 
the discriminatory land laws that have passed in Florida 
recently.
    Yes again, we do have national security concerns with the 
Chinese government, but to result in land laws where Chinese 
citizens are not allowed to own property in this country just 
solely on this baseless fear is the type of sledgehammer that I 
am talking about, rather than using a scalpel. We should be 
thinking about what precisely are the policy risks that we are 
talking about, whether it is with respect to solar energy, 
whether it is in respect to artificial intelligence.
    Whether it is just with respect to semiconductors, and 
address those policy issues, and not just engage in a broader 
narrative of the Chinese are declaring war against us. The 
broader narrative that we are in an existential threat with 
China. The other thing that strikes me about your analogy to 
the 1950's that is striking, is that even if in the 1950's 
where we had the Red Scare, average Russian citizens were not 
generally targeted.
    Average Asian Americans are being targeted right now, and 
that is what we are seeing. Whereas during the height of the 
Communist era, we still refer to it as a communist regime. We 
talked about the Putin regime. Now we just talk about the 
Chinese, or maybe we talk about the Chinese government, or the 
CCP.
    Yes, Xi Jinping is an autocrat. We can talk about that. We 
can talk about those specific policies. Let us talk about those 
policies and not a society and not a people.
    Ms. Manning. Mr. Yang, as we look to the future and 
increasing economic and potential military competition with 
China, many experts say that the most important thing we can do 
is continue to invest in our people, our education, and our 
ability to innovate, which has long been the envy of the world. 
I believe one of our superpowers is our ability to attract the 
best and the brightest from around the world to come study in 
the U.S. and oftentimes live and work in the U.S.
    What impact do you believe it will have on our country if 
we fail to attract the best and the brightest from around the 
world to come study and work in the U.S.?
    Mr. Yang. Thank you for that. It is absolutely correct that 
there are Asian Americans, not just Chinese Americans, but 
Asian Americans, and frankly people from around the country, 
around the world that no longer see the United States as the 
open society that it used to be, the society that would value 
that innovation, value having open discussions, and that is 
what we need to get back to, to understand that that is how we 
become stronger.
    The fact that I could represent the American government and 
the Department of Commerce when I am negotiating against 
Chinese people on the other side and represent our country. 
That is the strength of our country. That is what makes us 
special, and we should celebrate that.
    Ms. Manning. Thank you. Let me just mention that I was 
recently on a congressional trip to Japan, and one of the 
issues that was raised was the fact that Japanese students are 
no longer coming here to study in our universities, and that is 
a loss to our country, but it is also a loss to the strong 
relationship that is currently so important between the U.S. 
and Japan, and with that I yield back.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would just like to also remind 
my friends on the other side of the aisle that we are talking 
in this hearing about the infiltration of bad actors into our 
system, $6.5 billion of undisclosed funds, that is something 
that America should know about. Where would that money go? That 
is what we are trying to find out. Then I would like to 
introduce or acknowledge Mr. James.
    Mr. James. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Singleton, it is 
clear that CCP is aggressively expanding its military presence, 
but even more so, it is influence throughout the globe. What is 
even more concerning is its reach within the United States and 
on our borders. That is why I introduced the No American Tax 
Dollars to the CCP Act, which prevents the CCP from profiting 
off of us.
    From building their middle class on the backs of ours and 
building their military on the backs of ours. Unfortunately, 
higher education seems to be a tougher mountain to climb. 
Without checks--reasonable checks, checks that apply to the 
people who are sitting in this room, my colleagues as well who 
have to report all of our financial disclosures and cannot 
accept foreign donations, there are lower standards.
    Lower standards for those who have the public trust and 
taxpayer money in our university. Our top universities continue 
to send hundreds of millions of dollars-worth of valuable 
military and scientific research straight into the CCP's hands. 
This will only be used to undermine our stature and influence 
around the world.
    Now this should not be conflated or confused with our great 
need to be that beacon of hope, that light, that shining 
sitting on the hill, that destination for innovation and 
education goes around the world. At the same time, we cannot be 
taken advantage of. We have an obligation to protect the 
American people and our interests at home and abroad.
    Americans cannot own property in China, so why then is the 
CCP taking advantage of Americans? Mr. Singleton, your opinion 
sir, how does stolen research from our universities negatively 
affect America's effort internationally?
    Mr. Singleton. Sure. Absolutely. I would agree with Mr. 
Yang that targeted and tailored enforcement is essentially. 
Make no mistake, China is the worst offender in terms of 
intellectual property theft and tech transfer threat in the 
world. Now collaboration between the U.S. and China based on 
transparency and shared values can be incredibly valuable.
    China has not been transparent about its military buildup, 
and it has harnessed technology specifically developed by U.S. 
universities to subjugate and persecute its ethnic minorities. 
What is more, China's civilian university system plays a major 
role in China's military industrial complex, including its 
nuclear and cyber espionage programs.
    The CCP has specifically ordered civilian universities and 
their students to integrate into ``the military civil fusion 
system, and to advance the two-way transfer and transformation 
of military and civilian technological achievements.'' These 
types of collaborations simply require enhanced due diligence 
above and beyond standard practices.
    On this front, there is ample opportunity for Congress.
    Mr. James. Thank you for that. For my colleagues across the 
aisle who took great pains to educate all of us and took great 
offense to all lives matter over the past few years, our 
failing to give the American people enough credit to recognize 
that we can nuance the argument between CCP, who are 
adversaries, and Asian Americans who are our brothers.
    In your testimony you mentioned the need for our programs 
not funded by the CCP to equip future generations with key 
international skills like language learning and global 
expertise. How do you envision these programs, and how can a 
district like mine, a No. 1 manufacturing district in the 
Nation, a blue-collar district whose schooling focuses heavily 
on CTE and STEM.
    How can we keep pace with some of these expectations?
    Mr. Singleton. Absolutely. China has made absolutely and 
abundantly clear its focus on obtaining cutting edge 
information, both through illicit means, but also through 
routine exchanges in the academic and research space to advance 
its great power ambitions. The good news, if there is any here, 
is that there are tremendous opportunities and tremendous 
resources available to local stakeholders to freely 
investigate, and sort of conduct routine due diligence on their 
Chinese partners.
    The best one is the Australian Strategic Policy Institute 
has a Chinese university tracker that is entirely free. It is a 
free tool that helps universities and researchers understand 
the length between Chinese universities and China's military. 
Local FBI offices are also heavily involved in monitoring this 
threat.
    Think tanks like mine, and other research institutes 
collaborate with universities on a regular basis to help 
develop repeatable vetting models that allow them to evaluate 
whether a research partnership is a true threat, or whether you 
know, it is going to enhance American competitiveness, and 
deepen person to person ties.
    Mr. James. Thank you. I am sorry to cut you off. I 
appreciate that. My last few seconds I want anyone else on this 
panel to give us a to do list, homework on how we can help 
restore America's competitive edge, and this includes 
continuing to be that destination for Chinese, for Indian, for 
anyone who wants to come and contribute to America's 
competitiveness and not advantage our adversaries.
    I want places like Warren, Sterling Heights, and Rochester 
Hills in my 10th congressional District in Michigan to help 
America elevate its game. Thanks a lot. Mr. Chairman, I yield.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to recognize Ms. 
Jayapal.
    Ms. Jayapal. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Before turning to my 
questions, I just want to correct the record regarding 
statements around allegations of the Penn Biden Center. 
Republicans have suggested that the current administration is 
not taking its responsibility seriously to address allegations 
regarding the Penn Biden Center.
    The University of Pennsylvania has publicly stated that the 
Center ``Has never solicited or received any gifts from any 
Chinese or other foreign entity, as the university has never 
solicited any gifts for the Center. Since its inception in 
2017, there have been three unsolicited gifts from two donors, 
which combine to a total of $1,100.00. Both donors are 
American.
    I also want to remind my colleagues that the previous 
administration declined to investigate claims surrounding the 
Penn Center, stating that an investigation with respect to 
Section 117 compliance was unwarranted. I would like to enter 
into the record an article from the Daily Pennsylvanian from 
January of this year, outlining these facts.
    Chairman Owens. No objection.
    [The information of Ms. Jayapal follows:]
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    Ms. Jayapal. Thank you. I want to start by saying that I am 
deeply disturbed by the topic of this hearing, and I say that 
as one of just a dozen naturalized citizens to serve in the 
U.S. Congress, and the first South Asian American woman elected 
to the House.
    My parents sent me to the United States when I was 16 years 
old by myself because they believed that this was the country 
where opportunity was possible, that was not possible anywhere 
else. They sent me with the believe that America was a 
welcoming place, a place where I could thrive and reach my 
highest potential, and I have.
    This hearing today, reading the memo, listening to the 
comments today, talking about people as threats just because 
they were born in another country is just plain wrong. It is 
just wrong. It undercuts our ability to attract the best and 
the brightest. Frankly, it is hateful rhetoric that is a 
distraction from meaningfully addressing real national security 
threats, which we absolutely should do.
    Just in my district alone, I have got 11,000 international 
students who contribute $456 million to our economy. That is 
just my district. Imagine what the contributions are across the 
country. Mr. Yang, I want to thank you for being here today, 
and really for your decades of work to advance the civil rights 
of Asian Americans and Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders.
    I want you to just briefly, because I have a couple of 
questions for you, but briefly tell us the dangers of the 
escalating rhetoric about China and the proposed legislative 
actions in this space. The history that we' have gone through 
in this country where we have seen over and over again how that 
rhetoric hurts our Asian American people across the country.
    Mr. Yang. Thank you. I will try to be brief. The dangers 
are real. We have seen murders. Literally we have seen murders 
because of anti--Asian sentiment, and that will continue if we 
continue to have hyperbolic rhetoric. We have seen people that 
do not want to come to the United States. Part of this is 
making sure that we--in addition to preventing bad actors from 
coming in, we have got to keep the good actors that want to be 
here, here.
    That includes so many Asian Americans, Chinese Americans, 
students that come here for all of the reasons that we talked 
about that want to stay here, are being precluded from staying 
here because of this anti-Asian sentiment, because of 
restrictive laws regarding ownership of land or other things.
    Ms. Jayapal. One piece that I think is really important to 
talk about is the real value of international students, of 
researchers and professors, not just to increase campus 
diversity, which is of course great and wonderful. We support 
that. The benefits of U.S. foreign policy, and to our standing 
in the world.
    You touched on this briefly, but please elaborate a little 
bit on why it is so important to have this engagement with 
Chinese students, and how it helps us with our diplomatic 
strategy.
    Mr. Yang. There is so much misunderstanding right now 
between United States and China. I recognize that there are 
geopolitical challenges, but if you talk to the average 
American, and the average Chinese student, whether in China, or 
that are studying here, they find so much in common.
    If they--if we are setting up a situation where they are no 
longer talking to each other, they do not feel welcome here, 
then our divisions will just get further. Minds will harden 
even more, and foreign relations will become even more 
difficult.
    Ms. Jayapal. I do believe that there are legitimate 
security concerns that we have to address with protecting 
federally funded research. How would a precise response for 
preventing actual cases of espionage and intellectual property 
theft better serve our Nation. What does that look like?
    Mr. Yang. What it looks like is very specific definitions 
of what it means to have, for example, government control. What 
it means to have foreign influence. What it means is very 
understandable terms that universities and administrators can 
administer. What it means is making sure we have investigators 
that are trained to avoid bias, avoid stereotypes, and what it 
means also is to make sure that universities feel like if they 
make an innocent mistake, they will not get criminalized for 
that behavior.
    Ms. Jayapal. Thank you so much for your testimony. 
Demonizing communities for their country of origin breeds hate 
and discrimination. I hope we stop doing it. I yield back.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to recognize Mr. 
Banks.
    Mr. Banks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am glad my colleague 
brought up the Penn Biden Center because I want to ask some 
more questions about it. When President Biden opened the Penn 
Biden Center think tank at the University of Pennsylvania in 
2017, Chinese gifts to UPenn spiked. Chinese donors gave 105 
million dollars from mid-2018 to mid-2022, which is nearly 
double the known previous donations.
    The current Secretary of State Anthony Blinken served as 
the Center's Director. Many of its former employees now work in 
the White House. Then Vice President Biden illegally stored 
classified documents in his office at the Center. Mr. Moore, 
was the Department of Education aware of the spike in Chinese 
donations to UPenn after the Penn Biden Center opened?
    Mr. Moore. Thank you, Congressman. If I could begin by 
saying the reason that we knew about the money to UPenn, and 
the spike in the foreign contributions to UPenn was because of 
the reporting portal that we had created under Secretary Devos. 
We were also aware of the same pattern at many other 
universities.
    It was particularly startling to see with UPenn what they 
had received. That was very notable. Unfortunately, under 
Section 117 once that information had been reported we really 
could not do anything with it, and that is why I wrote that we 
were not going to open an investigation. It was not warranted, 
but that information should be public.
    The donors should not have been anonymized.
    Mr. Banks. You did look into opening an investigation, but 
Section 117 did not give you the authority to do so? Is that 
what you are explaining?
    Mr. Moore. Congressman, there were a number of public 
interest groups who accessed the information on the portal that 
the public can access, Congressman accessed, who became aware 
of that information that was being provided by UPenn. Some of 
them wrote to us, and I think Members of Congress wrote to us 
urging us to open an investigation.
    It would have been a very political thing, inappropriate 
frankly, for the Office of General Counsel if after UPenn had 
reported, in compliance with Section 117, which is a very bare 
reporting requirement. If we had then opened an investigation 
into UPenn, frankly, that would have been an act we should not 
have engaged in, and so we did not.
    Mr. Banks. You do admit that you did find it abnormal?
    Mr. Moore. Absolutely.
    Mr. Banks. The sheer amount of Chinese donations to the 
Penn Biden Center was not, that was not normal.
    Mr. Moore. It was extraordinary.
    Mr. Banks. What did you make of it?
    Mr. Moore. I can only speculate, but our job frankly in the 
Department of Education was to ensure that policymakers, 
Congressmen and women and the American people could see for 
themselves all that money going to UPenn from China and other 
universities to access our technology, and perhaps influence 
future policymakers.
    Mr. Banks. Yes. I mean we are talking about well over 100 
million dollars just to this one think tank center that 
obviously had deep connections to the Biden family, and now to 
the Biden administration, and yet you talk about you can only 
speculate, but what would the Chinese donors get out of that 
type of access?
    Mr. Moore. I think that is a very fair question, 
Congressman. If I might also point out it is I think the Biden 
Center has stated, or UPenn has stated repeatedly that they 
never solicited funds anywhere for the Biden Center. Instead, 
those funds came in, all their solicitations. They actually had 
the international fundraising operations that our current 
Ambassador to Germany Gutman to collect contributions--foreign 
contributions, but all those funds went into the general 
operating fund for UPenn.
    They did not go to the Biden Center. They were certain 
those funds were comingled, and certainly went to the general 
operations, and may have gone to the Biden Center, and that is 
something that I think is worthy of.
    Mr. Banks. I only got a minute left, but you were aware of 
it. You admit that it was abnormal. You said that the Chinese 
donations were flowing to other universities too. They were 
reported because of the strict Trump administration guidelines, 
but can you think of anything else? Any other think tank or 
university that received a comparable amount of Chinese 
donations to the Penn Biden Center?
    Mr. Moore. Not in that timeframe, absolutely not. I am 
unaware of them. The public did investigate on the portal to 
see if it occurred. I am not aware of it occurring.
    Mr. Banks. Really. It is wild. I mean you could not make it 
up. Now he is the President, Blinken is the Secretary of State, 
and they had these deep relationships. As you transitioned and 
prepared for the transition to the Biden administration did you 
keep files, documents, turn it over to them in hopes that they 
would do something about it?
    Mr. Moore. I mean I worked daily with the career people in 
the department, and certainly did not destroy anything. Our 
response was made public. We did not make any recommendations 
beyond what we made at the time that are public.
    Mr. Banks. Really crazy. I yield back.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to now recognize 
Mr. Sablan.
    Ms. Bonamici. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to our 
witnesses. As we saw during the previous administration, 
carelessness and wrongful targeting when discussing global 
perspectives in higher education can have a chilling effect on 
academic freedom. At best, it limits the ability of faculty 
members from other countries to advance groundbreaking research 
in their fields, and at worst it leads to unjust investigations 
and surveillance and prosecution of individuals.
    Callous and xenophobic rhetoric, particularly when it fails 
to distinguish between Chinese or other AAPI immigrants and the 
CCP has also led to a rise in hate crimes and intolerance 
toward Asian Americans and Asian immigrants, and I have seen 
that in the district I represent in Northwest Oregon.
    We have a lot of international companies, and a lot of 
people that are from around the world, and I have seen it 
firsthand in the district I represent. Many college campuses 
today include students, faculty and scholars who represent a 
diversity of backgrounds, perspectives, and life experiences.
    Portland State University, for example, in the district I 
represent is a testament to the power of value and global 
perspective and representation in American colleges. PSU 
enrolls more than 2,000 international students from 63 
countries, provides them with support, advising and career 
opportunities. In Oregon a couple of years ago in the district 
I represent, international students brought almost $41 million, 
and that was 1,555 students in the First congressional 
District.
    Or University of Oregon, my alma mater close to 1,300. 
Oregon State has more than 2,800 international students. At 
Portland State, again they establish a groundbreaking 3-year 
partnership with Seoul Welfare Foundation in South Korea, and 
they allowed PSU Master of Social Work and Ph.D. students to 
study Seoul's programs and delivery systems, and by forging 
those fruitful partnerships, this can benefit Oregonians and 
Americans.
    By supporting the well-being in academic achievement of 
international students, Portland State is leading the way and 
demonstrating how higher education broadly can be a global 
enterprise.
    Mr. Yang, I have a two-part question. What is the benefit 
to students, colleges, and the country to incorporate those 
global perspectives into college campuses, and how can we 
continue to uplift the importance of international engagements 
in higher education?
    Mr. Yang. No. Thank you very much for that question. 
Certainly, the cultural exchanges are absolutely vital if we 
want to avoid thinking in a zero-sum manner about the United 
States and China relations in particular. One thing that 
troubles me also is we are asking university officials often 
times asking them to be the watchdogs for espionage, or 
intellectual property theft, where they do not have the proper 
tools to do it.
    What happens in these situations is they over-correct, so 
even student organizations encounter frustrations in hosting 
events because there is a concern that that might be seen as a 
propaganda tool for the Chinese government. We need to continue 
to foster those exchanges. We need to continue to recognize 
that there is a common humanity in all of this, and if we 
continue to have exchanges between Chinese students and 
American students, I think the American ideals will actually 
clearly win in the end, such that the Chinese students as we 
have demonstrated throughout history, will want to come to the 
United States, learn from the United States, and stay in the 
United States and contribute to our economy.
    Ms. Bonamici. Right. Which I think is a reminder that we 
desperately need some good, comprehensive immigration reform 
because too often people come here and study, earn advanced 
degrees, and then end up having to go back and often times work 
for competing companies. I just want to put that word out 
there. It is not within this Committee's jurisdiction, but it 
is a critical issue.
    I also want to discuss the Biden administration's approach 
to enforcing the gift reporting requirements for colleges and 
universities under Section 117 of the Higher Education Act. The 
Department of Education under this administration has made it 
easier for universities to report gifts of more than $250,000 
as is required under the law.
    They streamline the reporting process through the Office of 
Federal Student Aid in conjunction with the Department's Office 
of General Counsel. Mr. Yang, why is it important for 
universities to be transparent about potential undue foreign 
influence, and of course we want to find the right balance, but 
be aware of and crack down on security concerns.
    How can the Department of Education strike the right 
balance to promote oversight and reporting without increasing 
institutional burden?
    Mr. Yang. Yes. Transparency is key, and I agree with all of 
my fellow panelists there. Part of that is simplicity, making 
sure that universities that are tasked with so much, so many 
different responsibilities, are able to understand those. Part 
of it is making sure that if they do make an honest mistake 
that they will not be criminalized for that.
    Part of this is ensuring that part of this process is that 
they will be able to work actually with our government 
officials, and foster some of these exchanges. I think if we do 
all of that right, then again whether it is with respect to 
research, whether it is with respect to education, cultural 
exchanges, I believe that our ideals will win.
    Ms. Bonamici. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, as I yield back, I 
want to note that as a representative of the Pacific Northwest, 
we saw firsthand the horrific effects of the Japanese 
internment. That is an awful part of this country's history. We 
need to tread very carefully in this area.
    I agree with my colleague, Congresswoman Jayapal, that the 
title of this hearing is unnecessarily inflammatory, and I 
yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to recognize Mr. 
Moran.
    Mr. Moran. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to the 
panelists here today for your information and your testimony. 
It is extremely important. I was concerned when I read through 
the briefing papers and began to prepare for this hearing. When 
I read through some of the examples of the censorship, direct 
and indirect, that the Chinese Communist Party is having in our 
colleges and universities today.
    Censorship in the form of direct censorship where the 
materials and discussions and research topics are being 
curtailed because folks are afraid, frankly, of the Chinese 
government, and then self-censorship from students that are 
here from China, and some China focused scholars that have 
expressed that they are refraining from making certain comments 
and participating in events, or engaging in debates that were 
critical of the Chinese government because they were afraid of 
retaliation.
    Then third, surveillance. That there are examples of campus 
discussions or activities where the Chinese authorities have 
surveilled those activities and come down hard on those 
students that have participated in them. Fourth, harassments 
and threats.
    Scholars, particularly ones from China, but also students 
have described being threatened by the Chinese government 
officials or others who seek to silence criticism toward the 
Chinese government. This is all very concerning to me. Aside 
from the Confucius institutes that we have talked about today, 
and aside from the money that is flowing into colleges and 
universities. It is not being reported back.
    It is significant. Mr. Singleton, I would just like to give 
you the first opportunity to talk about this, and tell me do 
these heavy-handed tactics by the CCP to chill free speech, and 
freedom of association concern you?
    Mr. Singleton. Absolutely. I mean I think we spent a 
tremendous amount of that conversation today talking about 
harmful rhetoric from American audiences, and I wholeheartedly 
agree with Mr. Yang's comments on that front. We do so at the 
detriment of talking about the Chinese Communist's Party's 
direct role and access on U.S. college campuses.
    Chinese students and scholars associations are a vignette 
of what we see across the United States. These are united front 
directed and funded organizations that operate at more than 150 
college campuses. They have been directly implicated in the 
harassment and intimidation of university administrators, but 
also Chinese students studying here in the United States, if 
and when they express political views that diverge from the 
preferred political narratives of the Chinese Communist Party.
    They have been involved in the suppression of free speech. 
The disruption of events involving the Uyghurs genocide in 
particular. They are wholly unregulated. These are 
organizations that receive, as I mentioned, funding and 
direction from the Chinese Communist Party. They report to 
Chinese consulates and the Chinese Embassy here in Washington, 
DC, and yet they are wholly unregulated with unfettered access 
to U.S. college campuses.
    Mr. Moran. Yes. I agree. I am really careful, I do my best 
to use the language Chinese Communist Party instead of talking 
about a nationality or an ethnicity because I recognize some of 
the issues that are presented when we do not do that correctly. 
I firmly believe that every person in this room was created by 
God with equal and eternal value, regardless of where they were 
created.
    I am real careful about that, but I am concerned about the 
Chinese Communist Party's influence in our colleges and 
universities. Not just what we brought up so far, but looking 
back at how they have influenced the Chinese Students and 
Scholars Associations, Mr. Yang, I want to turn to you and get 
some opinion about this from you.
    In 2017, the CSSA at the University of California San Diego 
protested against an invitation to the Dalai Lama to give that 
year's commencement address, and they said that they consulted 
with the Chinese consulate in 2019 about that issue. In 2019 
Columbia University canceled a planned panel on Chinese human 
rights violations, due to pressures from a ``Chinese student 
group''.
    Similar protests occurred in 2021 at the University of 
Chicago against the campus that with Hong Kong activist Nathan 
Long. These all seemed to go back to the Chinese Communist 
Party where the Chinese Students and Scholars Association, at 
least on some of these campuses were interfacing and 
interacting with the Chinese Communist Party to understand who 
they should protest and who they should not. What is your 
reaction to that?
    Mr. Yang. Thank you for that question. I agree that we 
should be looking at specific issues and there may be specific 
associations that are problematic. Where I have a concern is if 
we paint with a broad brush that all student associations or 
scholarship associations are problematic.
    The other thing that I would agree with you on is that we 
need to take a different law enforcement approach. Chinese 
students and professors right now feel caught between a rock 
and a hard place. They feel like on one hand that the Americans 
feel like they're not American enough.
    On the other hand the Chinese Communist Party is targeting 
them. We in our American communities, should be embracing many 
of them, and understand that we should be helping to protect 
them, to protect their rights here on campus or at their homes.
    Mr. Moran. Well, let me just be clear about my concern. It 
is not about Chinese people. It is about the Chinese Communist 
Party. That is where my concern lies. It is about the decisions 
made by a totalitarian regime to try to influence free speech 
and free association in this country. I thank you for your 
time.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to recognize Mr. 
Scott.
    Mr. Scott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Before turning to my 
questions I want to first address the concerns around Section 
117 compliance, the House and the Office of Federal Student 
Aid, there were comments made to argue the Department's move of 
Education Department's move of Section 117 compliance back to 
the Office of Federal Student Aid is a poor decision, but in 
fact the Office of General Counsel, where it was, is in no way 
equipped to evaluate financial statements and provide resources 
in the same manner as FSA is.
    Unfortunately, we continue to buck enhanced transparency 
and implementation of Section 117 by failing to increase 
funding for FSA, so I just wanted to make that point. Mr. 
Moore, exactly can you just for the record explain how 
compliance with Section 117 enhances our national security?
    Mr. Moore. Thank you, Congressman. I think that it enhances 
national security by providing full disclosure of information 
about possible foreign influences at universities, particularly 
universities with significant research institutions on campus 
where STEM technology is funded by the taxpayers.
    I think having knowledge about the relationships between 
foreign donors, especially from some countries that do not wish 
us well is extremely important for you as Members of Congress 
and for the American people.
    Mr. Scott. Mr. Singleton, does Section 117 compliance 
affect investment decisions made by university endowments?
    Mr. Singleton. No, it does not.
    Mr. Scott. Thank you. Mr. Yang, the conversation about 
foreign influence in higher education can often lead to over 
sensitization and an irrational fear of harm of foreign 
nationals. The title of this hearing is somewhat problematic, 
and it seems to instill fear into our minds.
    Can you say a word about how this kind of rhetoric can lead 
to the rise of incidents of bias, violence and discrimination 
against Asian American students and scholars?
    Mr. Yang. Thank you very much for that question. Certainly, 
whenever we talk about foreign influence it is an appropriate 
topic to talk about. When we start talking about whether it is 
the Chinese as a whole, even talking about it just in terms of 
the CCP, it can lead to over generalizations.
    One of the other analogies that I referred to the cold war 
earlier, was certainly during the cold war, and even now, we 
always referred to the Putin regime. We always referred to the 
authoritarianism in Russia. During World War II, we always 
referred to as Hitler's Germany or Nazi Germany.
    When it comes to Asia, we do not have that same nuance. 
During World War II, we referred to it at best as the Japanese. 
No one knows who Kara Zito was. Here now, we should be more 
specific if we are concerned about the autocratic regime in 
China, names the autocratic regime, whether it's Xi Jinping and 
his policies or the like.
    If we start to get to that level of nuance, that level of 
specificity, then we start to reduce the likelihood of 
violence, repercussion, or collateral damage against the Asian 
American community.
    Mr. Scott. I thank you. Can you remind us of the comments 
made by AAJC in the affirmative action cases recently decided 
by the Supreme Court?
    Mr. Yang. By who? Sorry.
    Mr. Scott. The comments by AAJC on the affirmative action 
cases.
    Mr. Yang. Sure. With respect to affirmative action, this is 
again recognizing that our community is very diverse. We have 
been supportive of affirmative action. We think it is important 
for the narrative of America to make sure that we understand 
that America includes all of our different communities, whether 
they are Asian Americans, African Americans, Latino Americans.
    Too often our community has been used as a wedge to drive 
again that narrative of we are somehow a model minority that is 
set apart from other communities. It is important to recognize 
that race still matters in this country. One message that I 
have for college students, when we are talking about 
universities, is that they should still be talking about race, 
their upbringing in their college essays.
    That is something that was explicitly allowed by Chief 
Justice Roberts, and our university officials need to recognize 
that diversity plays a critical role in our education system. 
That diversity will only strengthen our education system.
    Mr. Scott. Can you say a word about diversity within the 
Asian community?
    Mr. Yang. The Asian American community is exceptionally 
diverse, and sometimes you think of people like me, an East 
Asian Chinese American male. Obviously it includes Filipino 
Americans, Vietnamese Americans, South Asian Americans, Indian 
Americans, Pakistani Americans, and we need to recognize that 
diversity.
    When we talk about affirmative action, affirmative action 
benefits many of those communities that otherwise would not 
have a chance.
    Mr. Scott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to now recognize 
Dr. Foxx.
    Mrs. Foxx. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to thank our 
witnesses for being here today. Mr. Moore, the current 
administration has given no indication that any existing 
section 117 investigations are being continued. In fact, in 
August 2022, the American Council on Education wrote a thank 
you letter to the Department of Education for its ``plans to 
close'' all investigations.
    Why is it crucial for the Department to follow through with 
these investigations instead of quietly closing them based on 
requests from post-secondary education stakeholders?
    Mr. Moore. Thank you, Chairwoman. I think it is very 
important that closure of any investigation be fact based, and 
I was rather shocked to see the Vice President of ACE announce 
last August in that thank you letter that he had been told by 
Department officials that every investigation was going to be 
closed, and that responsibility for Section 117 investigations 
would be transferred to FSA.
    If the Department actually closes them, all the 
investigations in kind of one fell swoop without doing it in a 
fact-based way, I do not understand that. It seems like merit 
has been tossed out the window, other than let us get rid of 
these.
    Mrs. Foxx. Thank you. Mr. Moore, the Biden administration 
nearly finished its plan to transfer enforcement of Section 117 
away from the Office of General Counsel, and into the Office of 
Federal Student Aid, FSA. Given FSA's skillset and current 
workload to implement the President's illegal student loan 
cancellation schemes, is FSA well equipped to handle Section 
117 enforcement?
    Mr. Moore. Congresswoman, I do not believe that they are 
equipped at all to handle Section 117 enforcement, especially 
if everything was running smoothly with Section 117, and there 
was not a history going back many years of massive violations 
and lack of compliance, then you know, maybe it would be 
something to say okay, this can go on auto pilot to, you know, 
a less aggressive component of the Department.
    That is not the case. It is an extremely strange time to 
more or less downgrade the investigative potential that the 
Department has when they are looking at these investigations, 
so it does not make any sense at all.
    Mrs. Foxx. Thank you. Mr. Singleton, you mentioned the 
State of Florida passing bipartisan unanimous legislation to 
protect Florida universities. I also understand many Florida 
universities publicly supported that bill. Can you elaborate on 
how this coalition formed to promote common sense foreign 
influence reforms?
    Mr. Singleton. Absolutely. Yes, it did pass unanimously in 
both the Florida House and Florida Senate before being signed 
into law by the Florida Governor. It really was a whole of 
society approach. There was collaborative debate between 
universities, administrators, investigators from the Florida 
Governor's. What the law does is it prohibits the universities, 
their employees and representatives from soliciting or 
accepting grants from entities located in China, Russia, Iran, 
North Korea, Venezuela and I believe Cuba.
    It also mandates that State universities obtain approval 
from the Board of Governors before entering into contracts or 
partnerships with entities located in these countries of 
concern. They have to demonstrate that there is value to 
students, and that the agreements do not pose risks to the 
research enterprise.
    The third part is that the State of Florida Governors is 
now authorized to withhold performance funding for any 
university or college that has not met these requirements, or 
elects to enter into an un-authorized agreement, or partnership 
with a country of concern.
    There is both a carrot and stick approach. At the end of 
the day, university administrators, community stakeholders, and 
members of the Florida legislature all came together and passed 
this unanimously.
    Mrs. Foxx. I am glad to know that there is such enlightened 
people in the colleges and universities there in Florida, and 
that they saw the wisdom in coming together in this. I think 
protecting our students and national security should be a 
bipartisan issue. It should be something that all our citizens 
care about, and I urge my colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle to join Republicans in these efforts. Thank you, Mr. 
Chairman, I yield back.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like to recognize Mr. 
Grothman.
    Mr. Grothman. Thank you. We will go for Mr. Singleton here. 
In your testimony, you talked of the goals of things like the 
Communist Party would be to invest in American universities, to 
A, stifle free speech, which is something we have kind of seen 
in this administration, and otherwise monitor activities or 
propagate disinformation and false narratives. Could you please 
elaborate on that and tell us what type of disinformation and 
false narratives people might want to propagate?
    Mr. Singleton. Sure. The Chinese Communist Party is waging 
what it calls a discourse war against the United States.
    Mr. Grothman. Can you speak up?
    Mr. Singleton. Sure. The Chinese Communist Party is waging 
its discourse power against the United States and other allied 
democracies around the world. It seeks to----
    Mr. Grothman. We are not a democracy, but go ahead.
    Mr. Singleton. Yes. To seek and to set and shape global 
narratives about China's rise in ways by comparing, 
contrasting, and consistently misrepresenting the benefits of 
authoritarianism and the deficiencies, so-called, of democracy. 
On U.S. college campuses one of the things that they do is sow 
social division on college campuses, the Chinese Students and 
Scholars Associations that we've mentioned are specifically 
funded to best disrupt free speech protections, academic 
integrity.
    All the goal of presenting a particular political narrative 
around China's so-called peaceful rise.
    Mr. Grothman. Maybe I did not hear you. I want you to 
specifically tell us what type of narratives, and by the way 
when the Soviet Union was still around there was a KGB agent 
who left, and he felt that most of the money being spent by the 
KGB in the United States was not doing spying, it was in 
essence to spread disinformation in America to cause America to 
collapse from within.
    Could you give us examples, specific examples, of false 
narratives that representatives of the CCP might try to promote 
in American universities?
    Mr. Singleton. Sure. Absolutely. The first and foremost is 
that the United States is in decline, that the Chinese 
Communist Party does not represent the risk to U.S. national 
security or to the world order. They also propagate maligned 
narratives about Chinese human rights abuses seeking to 
neutralize the legitimate claims made against genocide in 
Chinese Communist Party directed genocide activities against 
the Uyghurs.
    This is all designed in many respects, like I said, the 
social division here, but to help propagate false Chinese 
Communist Party narratives across the United States, and to 
undermine our----
    Mr. Grothman. Could you give me those false narratives 
about the United States? What do they want our students to 
think about the U.S.?
    Mr. Singleton. Sure. They tend to want us to believe that 
the U.S. is a declining power, and that we should embrace the 
narratives and the lack of universal values that the Chinese 
Communist Party propagates, and the development of a new 
international order that reflects China's values, interests, 
that rejects human rights, that rejects universal values, and 
that seeks to in many ways divide the United States population 
against each other.
    Mr. Grothman. How would you divide the U.S.? How are we 
trying to divide the U.S. population?
    Mr. Singleton. Well, the Chinese call it cognitive domain 
warfare, and it is not the United States is certainly not the 
only target of the Chinese Communist Party's activities. We see 
them actively in places like Taiwan where they are seeking to 
divide the population against itself, but also convince----
    Mr. Grothman. Give me an example of how they are trying to 
divide Americans against themselves?
    Mr. Singleton. Sure. I mean simply propagating narratives 
that the U.S. Government is anti-Asian or seeking to perhaps 
put I think it is sort of been referenced here, Chinese 
Americans.
    Mr. Grothman. You mean they are trying to say the Americans 
are anti-Asian?
    Mr. Singleton. They see the U.S. Government as going 
against Chinese citizens, China, Chinese Diaspora communities. 
In fact, the new Chinese Ambassador here to Washington, DC. The 
first message that he sent out upon arriving in Washington, DC. 
was to communicate to all Chinese students across the United 
States saying the party is here to protect you.
    Mr. Grothman. I mean to me people who come here Asian, this 
is wonderful. I have some wonderful Asian friends. They are 
doing better than any other ethnic group in America. People 
from India, people from China, people from Philippines. Who in 
the world would--what possible narrative would they spread that 
would tell Asian students that America is anti-Asian? It seems 
just almost beyond belief you could even find something like 
that.
    Mr. Singleton. There is no doubt many instances in which 
there has been, you know, quantifiable rising anti-Asian 
rhetoric, or attacks--unacceptable attacks on Chinese students. 
What the Chinese State media and Chinese State actors do is 
they amplify those messages and that dialog in that discourse, 
seeking to portray the United States as a racist country.
    Mr. Grothman. Okay. Any specific groups that you can think 
of that may be funding or be behind--that might spread this 
divisive narrative?
    Mr. Singleton. The Chinese Students and Scholars 
Association is by far one of the most important.
    Mr. Grothman. Thank you.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you. I would like now to recognize 
Ms. Wilson for her closing remarks.
    Ms. Wilson. Again, I want to thank the witnesses for their 
testimoneys in today's hearing. We all agree that keeping 
America at the forefront of innovation and progress requires 
transparency in our academic and research ecosystems.
    I am glad to see the current administration amplifying 
compliance and returning oversight responsibility to the 
Federal Student Aaid office. FSA professionals are very 
experienced in this arena, consistently gathering data from the 
roughly 6,000 institutions that take part in student financial 
aid programs. This move has facilitated the reporting of on 
average over 3,000 transactions and 1.5 billion more per year 
under the administration compared to the previous 
administrations.
    Last, our effort to promote transparency and accountability 
should never be subject to politics or partisanship. Instead, 
we should focus on building sustainable, institutionalized 
oversight. We can and should strike a balance between ensuring 
compliance and keeping campuses safe for our students, our 
scholars, and our faculty, and I yield back.
    Chairman Owens. Thank you so much. I will just wrap up by 
saying I was very blessed to have been raised around the 
academic arena. My dad was a college professor for 40 years at 
Florida A&M, a World War II vet. It was interesting in that 
time when my community was taught certain things that really 
helped to be successful.
    We talked about faith, family, free market education in 
this community because we believe in that because we believed 
education was our gateway. We were hopeful, we were faithful, 
and we were tenacious enough to succeed. That community that I 
grew up in the 50's and 60's led the country to growth in the 
middle class, men matriculated from college, men committed to 
marriage and a percentage of entrepreneurs.
    That is the American way. We were also taught about the 
evil of Communism. We were not going to conflate an ideology 
with a race of people like we are doing today. We understood 
that the ideology was the most harmful for those who had to 
live under their oppression.
    Probably the people who are in the worst shape in our world 
today are people living on Communist China because of the 
ideology of misery that they have to live in for their freedom 
to be taken away from them. I am excited about the fact we now 
have these kind of conversations.
    For way too long with set back and talk fluff talk, 
thinking there is some kind of way we can convert Communist's 
evil, Marxism to our way of thinking. We need to understand 
this is our enemy. I think you would understand the reason why 
we know our college today that we do not have the same concerns 
because we now have Communists and Marxists impacting our 
colleges curriculum, 6.5 billion dollars of funds not being 
acknowledged says a whole lot about what type of influence they 
are having on our country today.
    I am proud of states like Florida and Utah. In the State of 
Utah, we have a bill called H.B. 346, which prohibits higher 
education institutions from seeking or accepting funding 
support from restricted foreign entities that shut down in Utah 
the Confucius institute.
    We also have a bill that prohibits all elementary and 
secondary schools in Utah from seeking or accepting funds from 
restricted foreign entities. That means they can no longer have 
the impact on Utah schools that they have across our country. I 
want to thank again the witnesses today for this very 
educational conversation. We need to keep this up. We need to 
understand that we are truly in a war against an ideology, not 
people.
    An ideology that hates our country, that hates our American 
way, and all we do is look around and see the impact of young 
people coming out of college with debt and still hating our 
Nation because we have an ideology being taught to them as our 
way. I am excited about what we are going to be doing as a 
Congress here.
    Just know for those institutions out there that 70 percent 
is not being upfront and transparent. We have a Congress in 
place now that is going to hold you accountable, but we expect 
you to really take your funds to let us know where it is, 
disclosure, full disclosure so the American people know where 
their tax dollars are going.
    Thank you so much for your participation, for your 
expertise, and with that being said, I would like to thank the 
witnesses and without objection, with no further business, the 
subcommittee stands adjourned. Thank you so much.
    [Whereupon at 12:09 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]

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