Investigation finds Harvard chose Chinese money, research over national security

A new finding from the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) found Harvard has for years consistently deferred to the CCP over U.S. interests.

In one incident, the university provided guidance to students on how to stop anti-CCP protesters on campus by using physical assault on the protestors, according to the report.

“Unfortunately, Harvard chose to prioritize the CCP beyond this single incident,” the committee said.

The investigation “identified a system where deference to CCP interests overrides American economic, technological, and national security interests.”

The committee made nine findings against the university, including participating in research conflicting with U.S. national interests, supporting people and entities that may have participated in Uyghur genocide, cooperating with Beijing’s military research universities, failing to track and screen programs that presented security conflicts, and creating a system that covered up gift reporting requirements to its own employees.

Researchers affiliated with Harvard co-authored more than 140 publications with a group of Chinese universities tied to the CCP military industrial complex, according to the report first reviewed by Fox News Digital.

Of particular interest were cooperative agreements by Harvard with some of the so-called Seven Sons universities in China that specialize in military research. Some of these universities remain on the Entity List, a list of restricted institutions posing national security risks.

A chart in the report shows Harvard engaged systematically with these Seven Sons defense institutions in engineering, computers, physical science, chemicals, biological science and biotech.

Ironically, a 2024 paper from Harvard warned of the danger of cooperation with these Chinese defense institutions.

“The paper concludes that academic collaboration with Seven Sons schools entails heightened potential risk due to their connections to the Chinese defense sector,” said the Harvard report.

In contrast, the University of Maryland, one of the largest research universities in the country, explicitly prohibits cooperation with these entities or enrollment of its students.

Fox further notes Harvard received more than $600 million from China under the federal Section 117 foreign-gift disclosure system, more than any other American university.

At the same time, the report found Harvard created an offshoot called Harvard Global, which was meant to circumvent the disclosure system.

In these cases, Harvard accepted the awards but did the research in places like CCP-controlled Hong Kong, the committee said.

“This evidence leads to a stark conclusion: Harvard’s pattern of conduct suggests an institution that prioritizes preserving lucrative financial ties to China over enforcing its own standards, American interests, and upholding its institutional responsibilities.”

The report notes it’s not just the institution being corrupted, but also the individuals.

The committee detailed the case of Dr. Charles Lieber, who was so intent on winning a Nobel prize in neurotechnology with Chinese help that he signed an agreement with the so-called Thousand Talents program.

The program was an effort by the CCP to recruit scientists who would help China acquire intellectual property by whatever means necessary, while compensating the scientists through undisclosed, foreign affiliations and double dipping.

A criminal complaint later alleged Lieber lied to federal authorities after receiving $1.5 million from the Wuhan University of Technology.

He was later convicted by a jury of concealing the money on both his federal tax returns and required federal banking and financial reports.

When asked why he accepted the money, Lieber said, “This is embarrassing. Every scientist wants to win a Nobel Prize.”

But he also agreed he lied to U.S. investigators when approached about the money, according to the New York Times.

“I was scared of being arrested, like I am now,” Lieber added.

The Committee found he spent two days in jail, with six months of house arrest. He also paid just tens of thousands of dollars in fines.

“Later, Dr. Lieber returned to China, not Harvard,” the report said. “In April 2025, Dr. Lieber joined the Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School as a Chair Professor of Tsinghua, the University’s highest honor.”

The report claims that today he has rebuilt his lab in China and is conducting experiments on human brain interfaces using rhesus monkeys.

“According to the Pentagon, People’s Liberation Army (PLA) scientists have investigated brain interfaces as a way to engineer super soldiers by boosting mental agility and situational awareness,” the report said.

The committee has recommended reforms to U.S. law to eliminate loopholes in disclosure and has demanded Harvard do more to police foreign sources of money and research.

“Harvard must eliminate mechanisms that could enable circumvention of transparency requirements, including the use of affiliated entities such as Harvard Global to route foreign funding,” the report concluded.