Arcadia, California, Mayor Eileen Wang resigned after she was revealed to be an illegal foreign agent for China. via REUTERS In his sitdown with Chinese capo Xi Jinping, President Donald Trump should raise holy hell over Beijing’s brazen espionage and covert influence operations in America, from Los Angeles to New York and everywhere in between, including in cyberspace and in our skies.
A cell including Eileen Wang, the mayor of Arcadia, Calif., ran an influence op just a few miles from downtown LA, focused on pushing Chinese Communist Party propaganda on the Chinese-American community, justifying Beijing’s aggression against Tawian, denying its ethnic cleansing of Uyghurs in Xinjiang and so on.
Past headline California cases include the infamous Fang-Fang’s seduction of Rep. Eric Swalwell and other politicians.
Back East, “Harry” Lu is now on trial for running a “secret police” station in Chinatown, working for China’s Ministry of Public Security by tracking, harassing and smearing US-based critics of the CCP.
Other Beijing ops in New York have penetrated Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office and even the NYPD.
And of course the Singham network openly pushes China’s line in US politics.
Don’t forget the spy balloon, nor the endless hacking.
Nor Beijing’s massive industrial espionage — thousands of cases of Chinese agents caught trying to smuggle controlled technology or munitions out of the country (and how many more who succeeded?), along with extensive operations at US universities and other research facilities.
Trump’s talks with Xi will cover plenty of horse-trading and dealmaking on everything from tariffs to tech, Tehran to Taiwan.
But on every front, the prez should flag that it’s harder to work with Xi when he openly insults America with China’s relentless, illegal penetration of American society.
Unrestricted access to US investment and markets fueled China’s rise to superpower status.
If Beijing won’t quit the spying and worse, how can Washington work with it on anything at all?
