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China Gifts Act

Model Higher Education Code
Mission Statement ActAccreditation Autonomy ActAccreditation Autonomy ResolutionSyllabus Transparency ActCollege Finances ActIn-State Enrollment ActChina Gifts ActCampus Freedoms ActHigher Education Gateway Requirements ActHuman Nature ActCampus Due Process ActCampus Intellectual Diversity ActUniversities Nondiscrimination ActProfessional Association Liberty ActOmbudsman ActGeneral Education ActSchool of Intellectual Freedom ActProgram Review ActCollege Credit ActCore Curriculum ActAmerican History ActHeritage Certificates Act

Introduction

China has been exerting influence on America via our universities and our K-12 schools for a generation. The National Association of Scholars (NAS) has been detailing the way China uses soft power to influence American policy via reports such as Outsourced to China: Confucius Institutes and Soft Power in American Higher Education (2017); Corrupting the College Board: Confucius Institutes and K-12 Education (2020); After Confucius Institutes: China’s Enduring Influence on American Higher Education (2022); and China and Our Children (2024). We also have assembled public data sources on the means and effects of Chinese (and other foreign) influence on American higher education, including our Foreign Donor Database, Confucius Institutes catalogue, and Illegal Ties to China catalogue.

Our federal government should have the primary responsibility for preventing China from exerting undue influence on America’s universities and K-12 schools. Yet Congress has been slow to pass appropriate legislation and our federal security bureaucracies also have been slow to act. Some aspects of education reform, moreover, may pertain more to the states than to the federal government. The states can take the initiative to remove Chinese influence from their public universities—and should. Our federal and state governments can work in complement to preserve American security.

Our model China Gifts Act is drawn almost entirely from Ohio’s SB 1 (2025), which we believe is the only state law to ban a public university from accepting gifts from the People’s Republic of China. This statute is simple, effective, and excellent; we call it our model Act, but all credit is due to Ohio’s legislators.

China is not the only foreign nation exerting undue influence on America’s universities. We have detailed other forms of undue influence in Outsourced to Qatar: A Case Study of Northwestern University-Qatar (2022); Hijacked: The Capture of America’s Middle East Studies Centers (2022); The Company They Keep: Organizational and Economic Dynamics of the BDS Movement (2023); Shadows of Influence: Uncovering Hidden Foreign Funds to American Universities (2024); and Instagram the Intifada: Mapping the Social Network of Students for Justice in Palestine (2024).

State legislators might well consider whether to enact other laws to increase transparency about all foreign gifts, modeled (for example) on the proposed federal DETERRENT Act. They might also consider whether to prohibit gifts from other countries inimical to American liberty, such as Iran or Qatar. We do not want, however, to muddle the argument for state legislation to reduce Chinese influence on American public universities. For the moment, our model Act concerns itself exclusively with prohibiting gifts from the People’s Republic of China and its agents.

Model Legislative Text

SECTION A

  1. No state institution of higher education shall accept gifts, donations, or contributions from the People’s Republic of China or any organization the institution reasonably suspects is acting on behalf of the People’s Republic of China. Nothing in this section prohibits a state institution of higher education from accepting payments from Chinese citizens related to instructional fees, general fees, special fees, cost of instruction, or educational expenses or donations from the institution’s alumni. Nothing in this section prohibits a state institution of higher education from receiving philanthropic or unrestricted grants so long as it maintains the structural safeguard requirements provided for in division (4) of this section. 
  2. Each state institution shall submit to the chancellor of higher education a copy of the report it submits to the United States department of education pursuant to 20 U.S.C. 1011(f). 
  3. Upon request, the chancellor shall make any information reported under division (2) of this section available to any member of the general assembly. 
  4. A state institution shall notify the chancellor of any new or renewed academic partnership with an academic or research institution located in China. A state institution shall only enter into a new or renewed academic partnership with an academic or research institution located in China if the state institution maintains sufficient structural safeguards to protect the state institution’s intellectual property, the security of the state of {State}, and the national security interests of the United States. The safeguards shall include, at a minimum, all of the following:
    1. Compliance with all federal requirements, including the requirements of federal research sponsors and federal export control agencies, including regulations regarding international traffic in arms and export administration regulations, and economic and trade sanctions administered by the federal office of foreign assets control; 
    2. Annual formal institution-level programs for faculty on conflicts of interest and conflicts of commitment;
    3. A formalized foreign visitor process and uniform visiting scholar agreement. 
  5. The auditor of state shall audit the safeguards implemented by state institutions of higher education under division (4) of this section.

SECTION B [“Definitions”]

  1. “People’s Republic of China” means the government of China, the Chinese Communist Party, the People’s Liberation Army, or any other extension of, or entity affiliated with, the government of China. 

SECTION C [“Severability”]

If any provision of this chapter, or the application of any provision to any person or circumstance, is held to be invalid, the remainder of this chapter and the application of its provisions to any other person or circumstance shall not be affected thereby.

Existing State Statutes

Ohio: SB 1 (2025)

The National Association of Scholars, in consultation with other supporters and friends of the Civics Alliance, drafted these model bills to translate into legislative language the principles in the Civics Alliance’s Civics Curriculum Statement & Open Letter. Just as these bills have been drafted with the expectation that different states will modify them as they see fit, they also have been drafted with the expectation that not every supporter of the Civics Alliance will endorse these bills or every part of them. Individual Civics Alliance signatories and supporters should not be assumed to have endorsed these bills, unless they say so explicitly.

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