STEM: Science, Technology, Espionage, and Math

Summary

Does the large scale admission of foreign students from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) PRC, especially those in STEM fields, pose an economic or security threat to the United States? More than 317,000 Chinese students are present in the country today, representing over one-third of all foreign students. The PRC government considers every one of these students an intelligence asset, and pressures them all to gather whatever intelligence they can during their time in this country.

George Fishman, the Center for Immigration Studies’ senior legal fellow, has been following this issue since 2005, and joins this week’s episode of Parsing Immigration Policy to discuss his recent report on the escalation of students from the PRC studying in the United States, the intelligence collection threat they present, and several steps the United States – and even states – can take to limit the espionage taking place at universities.

But don’t count on American universities to support any regulations or laws that will limit the number of PRC students coming to study and work in the United States. Fishman points out that universities have become reliant on the large population of Chinese students, most of whom pay full tuition. And it is not just universities that will likely lobby against any actions to control the number of PRC students in the country. Fishman explains how even the Biden administration cancelled an effective DOJ China initiative that focused resources on intellectual property theft by the PRC.

In the closing commentary, Mark Krikorian, the Center’s executive director and host of Parsing Immigration Policy, highlights the real employment crisis – the long-term decline in the work participation rate of men, especially those without a college degree. Referencing a recent Center opinion article that discusses the high percentage of prime age (25 – 54 years of age) men not working, Krikorian explains the role mass immigration (legal and illegal) plays in contributing to this situation and in disincentivizing government and private institutions to address the problem.