A Chinese researcher has been charged with trying to steal medical reports funded by the US government and smuggle them back to China.
Yunhai Li, 35, who came to the US on a research scholar visa, is accused of trying to return home with a trove of sensitive research in a case that will probably heighten concerns about the espionage risk posed by Chinese students.
His arrest comes amid an escalating row between Donald Trump’s Republican base and the US president, who suggested he would let in 600,000 Chinese students as part of trade talks with Beijing.
The move has been rejected by some of Mr Trump’s most ardent supporters, who have sweepingly claimed the students act as spies for Beijing and argued that the decision goes against his anti-immigration agenda.
Mr Li faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted over charges related to the theft of trade secrets and tampering with a government record.
Since joining the MD Anderson Cancer Centre in 2022, a leading facility at the University of Texas, the post-doctoral researcher worked on projects funded by the national institutes of health and the department of defence.
His work, which focused on research for a breast cancer vaccine, made him an employee of the state of Texas.
He resigned on July 1 after allegedly downloading 90 gigabytes of confidential files from the federally-funded project before it was finished. On July 9, he was stopped at customs at the George Bush Intercontinental Airport as he tried to board a flight to China.
The Harris County district attorney’s office said investigators “found evidence Li was attempting to take sensitive medical information abroad during an inspection of his belongings.” He was later released but arrested on August 22.
According to police reports, Mr Li acknowledged that MD Anderson would probably publish the work in the near future, but told investigators that he felt it was “going to waste” and intended to “continue his research” in China.
Court documents reportedly revealed that Mr Li was receiving grant funding from a Chinese state-controlled science foundation and was receiving a salary from a state-affiliated hospital.
A spokesman for MD Anderson told ABC: “As of July 1, 2025, Yunhai Li is no longer employed by the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Centre. Institutional leaders are working with relevant authorities on this matter.”
Student visas
The case will add fuel to the fire in the current row over Chinese students coming to US universities.
Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, vowed in May to “aggressively revoke” Chinese student visas and target students with “connections to the Chinese Communist Party or studying in critical fields”.
Beijing called it a “politically motivated and discriminatory action” and lodged a formal protest.
China is the second highest source of international students in the US after India. It is unclear why Mr Trump chose 600,000 as the figure is more than twice the number of Chinese students enrolled in the 2023-2024 year.
Yet, Mr Trump defended the proposal on Tuesday, saying US universities would struggle without Chinese students, promoting further accusations that he is favouring a trade deal over his supporter base.
In a rare break from the president, Laura Loomer, the Right-wing commentator, said in a post on Monday: “Nobody, I repeat nobody, wants 600,000 more Chinese ‘students’ aka Communist spies in the United States.”
Marjorie Taylor Greene, a traditional Trump loyalist, argued that America “should never allow” that move to happen, while Steve Bannon, one of Mr Trump’s former advisers, said “there should be no foreign students here for the moment”.
There is growing bipartisan consensus that US universities should not help train Beijing’s top talent in critical fields such as artificial intelligence and aerospace technology.
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