The House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which is chaired by U.S. Rep. John Moolenaar (R-MI), on Sept. 5 released a report finding that the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) and career officials have allowed U.S. taxpayer-funded research to be conducted with CCP-backed defense entities.
The “ground-breaking, investigative report” reveals that the DOD allowed such research to be done with China’s defense entities, said Rep. Moolenaar in a video posted to his X site on Sept. 5.
“That means the hard-earned tax dollars of everyday Americans were used to advance the military capabilities of our most dangerous adversary,” Rep. Moolenaar said.
The congressman noted that in the last two years, more than 1,400 research publications have been identified involving DOD-funded projects with Chinese partners — totaling more than $2.5 billion in taxpayer funding, “much of it approved under the Biden administration.”
Approximately 800 of the publications — over half — involved direct collaboration with Chinese defense entities, he added in the video.
“The bottom line is clear,” said Rep. Moolenaar. “Officials at the Department of Defense have allowed high-risk collaborations to run unchecked, eroding America’s strategic advantage, endangering our warfighters, all while doing so on the backs of United States taxpayers. The United States must never subsidize the modernization of China’s military.”
Release of the committee’s new report follows the September 2024 investigation led by Rep. Moolenaar (R-MI) and the U.S. House Education and the Workforce Committee that revealed how the CCP exploits U.S. universities and gains access to U.S. government-funded research to fuel its military and technological rise.
The report has found that the “collaborations involved research in sensitive technical domains such as hypersonics, quantum sensing, semiconductors, artificial intelligence (AI), advanced materials, cyber warfare, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance systems, and next-generation propulsion — many with clear military applications.”
The report also includes several case studies that point to national security risks, such as one case in which a DOD-funded nuclear expert at Carnegie Science largely worked on research for the Pentagon while holding dual appointments at the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Hefei Institute of Physical Sciences, according to committee staff.
Additionally, the 79-page report uncovered policy shortfalls, such as the finding that the DOD does not currently conduct post-award compliance or monitoring of grants, including in cases where risk mitigation measures were required.
The Select Committee also makes more than 14 recommendations in the new report, including to adopt Rep. Moolenaar’s Securing American Funding and Expertise from Adversarial Research Exploitation Act of 2025, also known as the SAFE Research Act.
If enacted, the bill would prohibit federal funding to researchers in science and technology fields whose collaborations with foreign adversaries may pose a national security risk and prohibit DOD funding to universities that partner with Chinese institutions that pose a national security risk.