China Initiative

DOJ ends Trump-era China Initiative program to fight espionage

FILE - Matthew G. Olsen, of Maryland, nominee to be an Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice, attends a Senate Judiciary Hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on July 14, 2021. The Justice Department is ending its China Initiative. The move announced Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022, by Assistant Attorney General Olsen amounts to a rebranding of a Trump-era program that was created to crack down on economic espionage by Beijing but that critics said had unfairly scrutinized Chinese professors on the basis of their ethnicity. (AP Photo/Amanda Andrade-Rhoades, File)Joe Biden’s Justice Department ended a Trump-era program that countered Chinese espionage against the United States. This week, the DOJ said the 45th president’s China Initiative was not broad enough and claimed it created a climate of fear among Asian Americans.