Australia’s biggest universities have accused the Trump administration of foreign influence and asked the Albanese government to intervene after local researchers who receive US funding were asked to declare if they have links to China and whether they comply with the president’s two gender policy.

Australian researchers working on projects jointly funded by US federal agencies have been sent a 36-point questionnaire asking them whether their university has any connections to socialist or communist parties, whether it has ever received funding from China, and whether the project takes appropriate measures to protect women and align with an executive order to recognise only two sexes, male and female.