US opens probe into University of Michigan's foreign funding

The United States Education Department said on Tuesday (Jul 15) it opened a foreign funding investigation into the University of Michigan while alleging it found "inaccurate and incomplete disclosures" in a review of the university's foreign reports.

As part of the investigation, the department asked the university to share, within 30 days, tax records related to foreign funding, a list of foreign gifts, grants, and contracts with any foreign source, and other documents, the department said in a statement and in a letter to the university.

The University of Michigan will cooperate fully with federal investigators and it takes its responsibility to comply with the law seriously, it said in a statement.

"We strongly condemn any actions that seek to cause harm, threaten national security or undermine the university's critical public mission," the statement said.

The Education Department said the university's research laboratories were "vulnerable to sabotage," citing charges brought by the US Justice Department against two Chinese nationals allegedly involving a University of Michigan lab.

In June, US federal prosecutors accused two Chinese nationals of smuggling into the US a dangerous biological pathogen that they said had the potential to be used as an agricultural "terrorism weapon".

Zunyong Liu, 34, a Chinese researcher, is alleged to have brought the pathogen into the US while visiting his girlfriend, Yunqing Jian, 33, in July 2024, according to an FBI complaint.

The complaint said he admitted to smuggling in a fungus so he could conduct research on it at a University of Michigan laboratory where his girlfriend worked. However, experts have raised doubt about the FBI's claim that the crop fungus smuggled was a threat.

In its statement, the Education Department said the university has received US$375 million in foreign funding since 2020 and was late in reporting US$86 million of that amount. US law requires universities to report donations from foreign sources exceeding US$250,000 in a year.

President Donald Trump's administration has launched a widely condemned crackdown against top US universities over a range of issues including pro-Palestinian campus protests against Israel's war in Gaza, transgender rights, climate initiatives and diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

Similar foreign funding probes were opened earlier at Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania and the University of California, Berkeley.