Audrye Wong is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and author of “Subversion and Seduction: China’s Economic Statecraft.”
Eileen Wang was the mayor of Arcadia, a sunny Southern California town — until May, when she pleaded guilty to acting as an illegal agent of the Chinese government. Her case highlights two fundamental, seemingly contradictory aspects of China’s influence efforts: They are far-reaching and pervasive, but the constituent parts — including the presence of entrepreneurial hustlers — do not always make for a well-oiled machine.
Beijing expects ethnic Chinese communities abroad to serve the motherland — read: the Chinese Communist Party’s interests — simply because of their heritage, while urging them to integrate into their host societies and engage with local politics. Individuals with ties to the CCP have allegedly worked as political aides and campaign fundraisers, run for American elected office and reportedly sought to influence electoral outcomes. CCP meddlers tap existing social infrastructure and turn to local liaisons to serve as eyes and ears on the ground.
According to her plea agreement, Wang operated a news site targeted at Chinese Americans and posted propaganda denying reports of human rights abuses in Xinjiang at the direction of a Chinese government official. At the 2018 founding ceremony of the American Southwest Chamber of Commerce, where she served as president from 2018 to 2022, Wang first spoke in English, emphasizing societal integration. She then delivered a different message in Mandarin, echoing Beijing’s rhetoric on promoting China’s rejuvenation and peaceful reunification of the motherland.
The CCP exploits personal vulnerabilities to recruit operatives willing to serve its cause. In 2024, the Justice Department accused a democracy activist of passing information on fellow Chinese dissidents to the Ministry of State Security in exchange for being allowed to visit ailing family in China. He pleaded guilty to conspiring to act as an unregistered agent of the People’s Republic of China in 2025.
At the same time, influence work is a two-way street. Individual hustlers seize opportunities to position themselves as influence fixers — sometimes exaggerating their own value — in exchange for favor, fame or fortune. Wang’s case is tied to those of two people sentenced on foreign agent charges: Yaoning “Mike” Sun, reportedly Wang’s former fiancé, assisted her campaign for city council. Sun worked closely with another individual, John Chen, who was sentenced to 20 months in federal prison for bribery and acting as an illegal agent of the PRC. According to court documents, Sun reported to Chinese government officials that Wang was a “new political star” with strong connections, and the two claimed credit for her electoral success.
These hustlers often champ at the bit to initiate activities and demonstrate their usefulness. Prosecutors said a Chinese government official messaged Chen about disrupting a member of Congress’s travel to Taiwan “just like you proposed.” Chen suggested contacting a former Los Angeles county supervisor who he said was “friendly to China.” According to the Justice Department, Sun requested funding for a pro-PRC demonstration at a July Fourth parade in D.C. Beijing’s agents also create new organizations and endow themselves with leadership titles to show prominence in their community. Chen and Sun created a U.S.-China friendship promotion association, while Wang and Sun ran the American Southwest Chamber of Commerce. Hustling can be a long game. Nearly two decades ago, the Los Angeles Times identified Chen as one of several individuals jockeying for community leader status and reported his role in organizing a rally against a CNN anchor who had criticized China.
Not all are slick operatives. Chen frequently expressed impatience at Sun’s tardiness at completing assigned tasks, while Sun at one point said he had not “written any reports in many years.” Chen bribed an IRS official (who was actually an undercover FBI agent) to investigate a Falun Gong center. While in detention, Chen reportedly bragged to a cellmate about being lucratively employed as a Chinese spy. In an effort to showcase their importance, hometown association leaders often engage in well-documented, splashy public events featuring speeches by Chinese government officials and even pledges to uphold core Chinese policies.
But ham-handed incidents do not mean that Chinese influence attempts should be dismissed. It is harder to catch influence agents who are good at their job. Hustlers are also useful to the Chinese government because they are expendable. When political will is strong and resources are ample, missteps are assumed to be part of the game.
Eager influence agents may not always provide significant returns for the CCP. It is unclear how much impact Wang’s news site had, or if she advocated for Chinese government interests while in office. But their actions make overseas Chinese communities feel watched and outnumbered — that the long arm of the CCP is reaching into democratic societies — and obscure the broader diversity of the diaspora’s views.
The admirable work of law enforcement is most likely only scratching the surface. Successful prosecution has largely rested on overt violations of the law, such as bribery, physical harassment and acting as an undeclared foreign agent. But much of Beijing’s influence activities rely on gray-zone tactics that seek to structurally reshape the social, political and information landscapes in favor of CCP interests, even if these actions are not technically illegal.
To outhustle the CCP, the United States needs to emphasize how members of the Chinese diaspora living overseas are vulnerable to being manipulated by the CCP — and disposable in the eyes of party officials. Legal prosecutions are an important deterrent for would-be influence agents. This should go hand in hand with efforts to build longer-term societal resilience: empowering Chinese American communities and civil society to push back against the CCP’s gray-zone influence campaign.
That will make hustling for the CCP less attractive and ensure that grassroots leaders and elected officials can represent the true interests of Chinese Americans.
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