Yves here. On one level, this story about the Administration intensifying its campaign against furriners, here academics, should come as no surprise. The Trump Team has made clear its desire to remove or downgrade the position of non-whites and women, and also views expertise and education with prejudice. Trying to enlist UDSA investigators into a pogrom of sorts against foreign researchers, even ones not in the US, is a twofer of sorts. It advances the Trump low-brow ethnic purity agenda while also making even the USDA staffers who pass the current test fearful. What McCarthyite pretext might be dreamed up to go after them next?
By Lisa Song, who reports on the EPA and related agencies that oversee the environment, climate change, and science for ProPublica and Sharon Lerner, who covers health and the environment and the agencies that govern them for ProPublica. Originally published at ProPublica; cross posted from Undark
President Donald Trump’s administration is directing employees at the U.S. Department of Agriculture to investigate foreign scientists who collaborate with the agency on research papers for evidence of “subversive or criminal activity.”
The new directive, part of a broader effort to increase scrutiny of research done with foreign partners, asks workers in the agency’s research arm to use Google to check the backgrounds of all foreign nationals collaborating with its scientists. The names of flagged scientists are being sent to national security experts at the agency, according to records reviewed by ProPublica.
At a meeting last month, USDA supervisors pushed back against the instructions, with one calling it “dystopic” and others expressing shock and confusion, according to an audio recording reviewed by ProPublica.
The USDA frequently collaborates with scientists based at universities in the U.S. and abroad. Some agency workers told ProPublica they were uncomfortable with the new requirement because they felt it could put those scientists in the crosshairs of the administration. Students and postdocs are particularly vulnerable as many are in the U.S. on temporary visas and green cards, the employees said.
Jennifer Jones, director for the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, called the directive a “throwback to McCarthyism” that could encourage scientists to avoid working with the “best and brightest” researchers from around the world.
“Asking scientists to spy on and report on their fellow co-authors” is a “classic hallmark of authoritarianism,” Jones said. The Union of Concerned Scientists is an organization that advocates for scientific integrity.
Jones, who hadn’t heard of the instructions until contacted by ProPublica, said she had never witnessed policies so extreme during prior administrations or in her former career as an academic scientist.
The new policy applies to pending scientific publications co-authored by employees in the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service, which conducts research on crop yields, invasive species, plant genetics, and other agricultural issues.
The USDA instructed employees to stop agency researchers from collaborating on or publishing papers with scientists from “countries of concern,” including China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and Venezuela.
But the agency is also vetting scientists from nations not considered “countries of concern” before deciding whether USDA researchers can publish papers with them. Employees are including the names of foreign co-authors from nations such as Canada and Germany on lists shared with the department’s Office of Homeland Security, according to records reviewed by ProPublica. That office leads the USDA’s security initiatives and includes a division that works with federal intelligence agencies. The records don’t say what the office plans to do with the lists of names.
Asked about the changes, the USDA sent a statement noting that in his first term, President Donald Trump signed a memorandum designed to strengthen protections of U.S.-funded research across the federal government against foreign government interference. “USDA under the Biden Administration spent four years failing to implement this directive,” the statement said. The agency said Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins last year rolled out “long-needed changes within USDA’s research enterprise, including a prohibition on authoring a publication with a foreign national from a country of concern.”
International research has been essential to the Agricultural Research Service’s work, according to a page of the USDA website last updated in 2024: “From learning how to mitigate diseases before they reach the United States, to testing models and crops in diverse growing conditions, to accessing resources not available in the United States, cooperation with international partners provides solutions to current and future agricultural challenges.”
Still, the U.S. government has long been worried about agricultural researchers acting as spies, sometimes with good reason. In 2016, the Chinese scientist Mo Hailong was sentenced to three years in prison for conspiring to steal patented corn seeds. And in 2022, Xiang Haitao, admitted to stealing a trade secret from Monsanto.
National security questions have also been raised about recent increases in foreign ownership of agricultural land. In 2022, Congress allocated money for a center to educate U.S. researchers about how to safeguard their data in international collaborations.
Since Trump took office last year, foreign researchers have faced increased obstacles. In March last year, a French researcher traveling to a conference was denied entry to the U.S. after a search of his phone at the airport turned up messages critical of Trump. The National Institutes of Health blocked researchers from China, Russia, and other “countries of concern” from accessing various biomedical databases last spring. And in August, the Department of Homeland Security proposed shortening the length of time foreign students could remain in the country.
But the latest USDA instructions represent a significant escalation, casting suspicion on all researchers from outside the U.S. and asking agency staff to vet the foreign nationals they collaborate with. It’s unclear if employees at other federal agencies have been given similar directions..
The new USDA policy was announced internally in November and followed a July memo from Rollins that highlighted the national security risks of working with scientists who are not U.S. citizens.
“Foreign competitors benefit from USDA-funded projects, receiving loans that support overseas businesses, and grants that enable foreign competitors to undermine U.S. economic and strategic interests,” Rollins wrote in the memo. “Preventing this is the responsibility of every USDA employee.” The memo called for the department to “place America First” by taking a number of steps, including scrutinizing and making lists of the agency’s arrangements to work with foreign researchers and prohibiting USDA employees from participating in foreign programs to recruit scientists, “malign or otherwise.”
Rollins, a lawyer who studied agricultural development, co-founded the pro-Trump America First Policy Institutebefore being tapped to head the agency.
There have long been restrictions on collaborating with researchers from certain countries, such as Iran and China. But these new instructions create blanket bans on working with scientists from “countries of concern.”
In a late November email to staff members of the Agricultural Research Service at one area office, a research leader instructed managers to immediately stop all research with scientists who come from — or collaborate with institutions in — “countries of concern.”
The email also instructed employees to reject papers with foreign authors if they deal with “sensitive subjects” such as “diversity” or “climate change.” National security concerns were listed as another cause for rejection, with USDA research service employees instructed to ask if a foreigner could use the research against American farmers.
Mica Rosenberg contributed reporting. Adriana Pera contributed research.
