US Feds Are Freaking Out Over Alleged Plot To Smuggle Crop-Killing Fungus Into US

The fungus is already found in the US, but it could possibly have been engineered to resist treatment or spread more easily, posing a serious threat to American agriculture, according to an expert who reckons they need to run tests on the sample asap.

The toxins produced by the fungus can also cause vomiting and liver damage in humans.

“The CCP will use every tool in its warfare toolbox to cripple the United States and bring us to our knees. A pathogen like this, if successfully introduced into a crop, could inflict significant economic loss for U.S. agriculture producers,” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rick Crawford (R-Ark.) told the media.

Senator Joni Ernst said it appears the FBI may have intercepted a “potential bioweapon.”

“We are very fortunate the Trump administration and federal law enforcement stopped this potential bioweapon before it compromised our nation’s food supply.”

“This is exactly why I have always said and will continue to say – food security is national security. Between this latest bioweapon and China’s highly concerning purchases of U.S. farmland around our military bases, we must stay on guard against the threat from Communist China in our own backyard.”

The US already eyes China with heightened paranoia after they claimed that the virus that causes COVID-19 was enhanced by China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology as part of US-funded “gain-of-function” research of the naturally occurring SARS pathogen. China denies that COVID leaked from the lab, but US intel agencies now say that appears to be the most likely cause of the pandemic.“The bacteria can infect wheat, barley, corn and rice. When it does, it can devastate crops,” one national security source who specialises in agricultural microbiology said.“The key question is if the bacterial strain being brought in has been modified to make it resistant to treatment or to make it more pathogenic.”The source added that it could be dangerous “if the Chinese manipulated the strain” and that federal investigators should “have a genome sequence done” on the samples Jian and Liu allegedly conspired to smuggle into the country.

Liu, who works as a researcher at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, arrived in Detroit on a Delta flight from Shanghai and was interviewed by Customs and Border Patrol agents about the purpose of his travel. He claimed he was in the US to visit Jian, a lab researcher at the University of Michigan, whom he identified as his girlfriend.

Searching his belongings, agents found four plastic baggies containing “fibrous material” infected with the pathogen, as well as a round piece of filter paper with a series of circles drawn on it, concealed in his backpack in a ball of wadded up tissues.

Liu initially denied that the packages were his and claimed someone else might have put them in his luggage. However, he later admitted they were different strains of Fusarium graminearum that he intended to research at the Molecular Plant-Microbe Interaction (MPMI) Laboratory at the University of Michigan, where Jian researches similar pathogens.Liu told investigators that he planned to clone the different strains and make more samples if the experiments on the bagged materials failed. The real smoking gun was Liu’s cell phone, which revealed an article in PDF form titled “2018 Plant-Pathogen Warfare under Changing Climate Conditions.”According to authorities, the article specifically referenced Fusarium graminearum as “an example of a destructive disease and pathogen for crops” and is “responsible for billions of dollars in economic losses worldwide each year.”Liu was immediately fast-tracked for removal to China.

Jian’s cell phone also had the feds freaking out after they discovered a document she signed which included a loyalty pledge to “adhere to the four basic principles” and “support the leadership of the Communist Party of China.”

FBI Special Agent Edward Nieh said in his affidavit that one of the principles Jian signed her allegiance to includes “upholding Mao Zedong thought and Marxism-Leninism.”

Fusarium graminearum causes estimated losses of $200-400 million to US agriculture every year, but the fungus has been endemic in the US for more than 40 years. Scientists acknowledged that the introduction of the organism into the US does not, by itself, pose a new threat.

Jian has been ‘temporarily detained’ until her detention hearing scheduled for Thursday, but Liu is currently in the wind and authorities have issued a warrant for his arrest.

[Source: NYPost]