Yet again, federal agents caught Chinese nationals smuggling forbidden microorganisms into the country. And yet again, they were linked to the University of Michigan (UM) in Ann Arbor.
In the third such case since June, three Chinese “researchers” were caught trying to smuggle genetically enhanced roundworms into the country, allege prosecutors in the Eastern District of Michigan. And frighteningly, in this case and another, the “researchers” were from Wuhan, site of the laboratory from which the Covid-19 virus escaped to infect the planet.
The latest arrests raise the question of why President Donald Trump vowed to permit 600,000 Chinese “students” to enter the United States.
The Latest Case
Te case involves three men with J-1 student visas: Xu Bai, 28; Fengfan Zhang, 27; and Zhiyong Zhang, 30. Bai and F. Zhang are “charged with conspiracy to smuggle biological materials into the United States and Z. Zhang is charged with making false statements to federal agents,” the Justice Department (DOJ) reported:
According to the criminal complaint, in 2024 and 2025, Bai and F. Zhang were the recipients of multiple shipments containing concealed biological materials related to round worms which had been sent from the PRC to the United States by Chengxuan Han, a citizen of the PRC [People’s Republic of China]. Han was pursuing a Ph.D. from the College of Life Science and Technology in the Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST) in Wuhan, PRC and in June 2025, traveled to the United States to work in the laboratory at UM. Han recently pleaded no contest to three counts of smuggling and one count of false statements, was sentenced and then removed from the United States.
After Han’s arrest and removal from the United States, UM initiated an internal investigation into the Shawn Xu laboratory. All three defendants refused to attend a mandatory meeting or participate in the investigation and so were terminated. This termination made them eligible for removal by the Department of Homeland Security.
Anyone who doesn’t think something fishy is going on hasn’t watched enough Fu Manchu movies.
The defendants knew federal agents suspected them of a crime, and attempted to flee the United States. They bought airline tickets to flee the country on October 20. Destination: China. On October 10, federal agents looked for them “at their home and elsewhere but were unsuccessful,” prosecutors allege. The same day, they rebooked their flights for October 15.
“They also booked flights to the PRC departing from John F. Kennedy International Airport for 2:00 a.m. on October 16, 2025,” the allegations continue:
The defendants did not cancel or show for their [Detroit Metropolitan Airport] flight on October 15, 2025. Defendants instead traveled to New York and attempted to board the early morning JFK flight to the PRC on October 16. During an inspection by CBP [Customs and Border Protection], Z. Zhang made false statements about Han. Bai and F. Zhang told CBP officers they had received packages from Han including after her arrest or removal from the United States.
Han fessed up in August, was sentenced to time served on September 10 and booted back to China, where she belongs, CBS reported, on September 11.
The network also explained what the latest three Asiatic miscreants tried to smuggle in:
The criminal complaint said a UPS shipment from Han that was inspected and intercepted by Customs and Border Patrol in March was intended for delivery to Bai’s apartment in Ann Arbor. This particular shipment was among the incidents that Han pleaded no contest to in September, court records state.
There were other packages sent to Ann Arbor addresses, including some that authorities believe were intended for Fengfan Zhang but were addressed to Dylan Zhang. One such package included eight petri dishes “containing C. elegans with genetic modifications,” the complaint said.
C. [elegans] is “also known as roundworms,” according to the complaint. The University of Minnesota says Caenorhabditis elegans is a small, primitive organism that is considered ideal for certain biological research.
June Agroterror Arrest
These four bring to six the number of Chinese “researchers” caught smuggling illegal material into the United States in recent months.
In June, Yunqing Jian, a postdoctoral fellow at UM, smuggled Fusarium graminearum into the United States, prosecutors alleged. Also charged was her boyfriend, Zunyong Liu. He worked at a university in China that was also experimenting on the same organism. The pair was charged with conspiracy, smuggling goods into the United States, false statements, and visa fraud.
Had the fungus escaped the lab as did the Covid-19 virus, an agricultural cataclysm could have been the result, DOJ noted:
Scientific literature classifies [Fusarium graminearum] as a potential agroterrorism weapon. This noxious fungus causes “head blight,” a disease of wheat, barley, maize, and rice, and is responsible for billions of dollars in economic losses worldwide each year. Fusarium graminearum’s toxins cause vomiting, liver damage, and reproductive defects in humans and livestock.
Stop the Visas
Despite the three cases, President Trump wants to admit 600,000 Chinese “students” into the United States.
“We’re going to get along good with China. I hear so many stories about ‘We’re not going to allow their students’” to come in, Trump said, NBC reported:
“We’re going to allow, it’s very important, 600,000 students. It’s very important.”
It’s a sharp departure from an announcement Secretary of State Marco Rubio made in May, when he promised the United States would “aggressively revoke” visas for Chinese students and add more scrutiny to all future visa applications from China.
That move infuriated Trump-MAGA supporters such as Georgia’s U.S. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene.
“We should not let in 600,000 CHINESE students to attend American colleges and universities that may be loyal to the CCP,” Greene wrote on X. “Why are we allowing 600,000 students from China to replace our American student’s opportunities?”
In March, GOP Senator Ashley Moody of Florida introduced the Stop CCP Visas Act, which would prohibit issuing visas to Chinese “students” and “researchers.”
