United States: A NASA researcher and Texas A&M University professor admits to allegations of hiding his ties to a Chinese government-built university while accepting federal grant money.

During a hearing in Houston federal court on Thursday, Zhengdong Cheng pleaded guilty to two counts of violating NASA regulations and falsifying official documents.

Cheng's sentencing was part of a program known as the China Initiative, which began during the Trump administration. However, the Justice Department canceled the program in February after receiving complaints that it hindered academic collaboration and contributed to anti-Asian bias.

In the past year, the department has also faced high-profile setbacks in individual lawsuits, resulting in the dismissal of several criminal cases against academic researchers. The Justice Department said it intends to raise the bar for such lawsuits.

When Cheng was arrested in August 2020, he was initially charged with wire fraud, conspiracy and making false statements. However, as part of a settlement with federal prosecutors, he pleaded guilty to new charges.

Cheng was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Andrew Heenan after he had already served during his pre-trial incarceration, which was about 13 months. Cheng also agreed to pay US$86,876 in compensation and a fine of US$20,000.
Cheng's lawyer, Philip Hilder, said the professor was "relieved that this unfortunate chapter in his life was behind him."

However, Hilder criticized the China Initiative programme, claiming that while its original purpose was to "counter economic espionage ... in his case this was not the case."

"As a Department of Justice priority, China's initiative has now been phased out." The overall mission to detect economic espionage remains the same, but with an emphasis on targeting wrongdoers based on their actions rather than their ethnicity," Hilder explained.

Prosecutors accused Cheng, who joined Texas A&M in 2004, of concealing his work in China while his team received nearly $750,000 in grants for space research. NASA is prohibited from using funds to collaborate or coordinate with China, Chinese institutions, or Chinese-owned businesses.

Prosecutors allege that Cheng violated those sanctions by maintaining several undisclosed ties with China, including serving as the director of a soft matter institute at a University of Technology in Guangdong, China, established by China's Ministry of Education.

Texas A&M Systems Chancellor John Sharp said in a statement Friday, "Texas A&M and Texas A&M Systems take security very seriously, and we are constantly on the lookout for vulnerabilities, especially when national security is involved. Is." "We will continue to cooperate with our federal partners to protect our intellectual property and keep us out of the hands of foreign governments who harm us."

Soon after his arrest, Cheng was fired from Texas A&M. Texas A&M is approximately 145 kilometers (90 mi) northwest of Houston.
According to Hilder, Cheng has an education, but is considering his options for the future.

"He is a proud, loyal American citizen who hopes to be a productive member of our society," Hilder said.
On Friday, James Smith, in charge of the FBI Houston, tweeted that his agency "prioritises the investigation of threats to education as part of our commitment to preventing intellectual property theft at US research institutions and companies."

Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen told reporters in February that he believed the initiative was motivated by genuine national security concerns. He said he did not believe investigators targeted professors based on their ethnicity, but added that they needed to be accountable to the concerns they heard, including from Asian-American groups.

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