U.S. drops case against MIT professor accused of China ties

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department dropped its case Thursday against a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor accused of concealing ties to the Chinese government, a further setback to a federal initiative aimed at preventing Beijing from profiting off academic research at U.S. colleges and universities.

The department revealed its decision in the case against Gang Chen in a single-page filing in federal court in Boston, saying it could no longer meet its burden of proof.

U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins, the top federal prosecutor in Massachusetts, said the move was "in the interests of justice" and was the result of new information the government had received about the allegations.

"After a careful assessment of this new information in the context of all the evidence, our office has concluded that we can no longer meet our burden of proof at trial," Rollins said. "As prosecutors, we have an obligation in every matter we pursue to continually examine the facts while being open to receiving and uncovering new information."

The outcome, which had been expected and earlier recommended by prosecutors in Boston, is a blow to a Justice Department effort known as the China Initiative, which was set up in 2018 to crack down on Chinese economic espionage and trade secret theft.

A key prong of the initiative has focused on academics in the U.S. accused of concealing research ties to China on grant applications, but critics have say it has unduly targeted researchers based on ethnicity.

The Justice Department is currently reviewing the future of the program, a process expected to be complete in the coming weeks, said spokesperson Wyn Hornbuckle.

Chen, a mechanical engineering professor at MIT, was arrested in the final days of the Trump administration and charged last year with concealing ties to Beijing while also collecting U.S. dollars for his nanotechnology research.