US Lawmakers Aim to Limit Citizens of China and Russia from Accessing DOE Labs

The headquarters of the Department of Energy.
(Quentin Kruger / DOE)
The Senate Intelligence Committee is proposing to prohibit citizens of China and Russia without permanent residence status in the U.S. from accessing Department of Energy national labs without a waiver. The proposal is contained in the Intelligence Authorization Act
The legislation states that while “international cooperation in the field of science is critical to the United States maintaining its leading technological edge,” the DOE lab system “is increasingly targeted by adversarial nations to exploit military and dual-use technologies for military or economic gain.”
It also states that more than 8,000 citizens from China and Russia were granted access to DOE national labs in fiscal year 2023, out of a total of around 40,000 foreign users of the labs. Many of these visits presumably were to the labs’ scientific user facilities, which DOE historically has made broadly available to external researchers.
DOE is pushing back against the proposed restriction. “This proposal would have a significant impact on our national laboratories. DOE is working with the Senate Intelligence Committee and other congressional offices to provide information about the role of foreign nationals in the department’s overall scientific enterprise and more broadly, the nation’s global economic competitiveness,” a DOE spokesperson told FYI.
Although the House Intelligence Committee’s version
The Biden administration has objected
“The existing visitor-screening process at the national laboratories and nuclear weapons production facilities are specifically designed to screen for visitor threats and prevent access to protected information,” the White House added.
This position suggests the administration will also push back on the proposal from the Senate Intelligence Committee.