Today’s hearing is on the Chinese Communist Party’s economic espionage and malign influence targeted at the subnational level. This is an active threat, and we will examine how these activities have accelerated in scale, intensity, and sophistication over the past decade.
The CCP’s professed desire for “constructive” relations, its pursuit of so-called “win-win” outcomes, and its supposed respect for the sovereignty of other nations are all promises the CCP will always break.
The CCP is engaged in an epic campaign to undermine the United States here at home, spanning economic and traditional espionage, state-directed cyber intrusions, talent recruitment programs, information warfare, covert influence networks, legal and illegal lobbying, blackmail, infiltrating our critical infrastructure, and transnational repression aimed at the Chinese diaspora.
In fact, the CCP is the largest oppressor of Chinese people in the world, and it has targeted Chinese-Americans who courageously speak out against it.
Just last month, Eileen Wang, the mayor of Arcadia, California, which is home to 60,000 people, was arrested for acting as an illegal agent of the Chinese government for activities undertaken before she was mayor. She pleaded guilty and is now in prison.
This Chinese government agent – acting at the direction of PRC government officials – took advantage of our free and open society to carry out an agenda on behalf of the CCP. This is an alarm bell for all of us that the CCP’s malign influence must be confronted.
United Front Work—one of the CCP’s primary instruments for political influence—is a core component of this strategy. What makes it uniquely concerning is that it is not simply a foreign intelligence activity conducted from afar; it is a comprehensive, influence operation that reaches deep into communities, businesses, and institutions across the United States, often through seemingly benign cultural, academic, or commercial engagement.
It operates by exploiting three primary levers: access, coercion, and incentives.
First, it seeks access to state and local officials, business leaders, university researchers, and community organizations. In many cases, this access is earned through partnerships that appear mutually beneficial: trade delegations, sister‑city relationships, student exchanges, or local investment initiatives.
However, these channels can be repurposed to collect strategic information, shape local decision‑making, or identify individuals who can be influenced or co‑opted.
Second, coercion plays a central role. The CCP cruelly exploits vulnerabilities among diaspora communities, including family ties in China, business dependencies, or immigration concerns. Individuals may be pressured—subtly or directly—to support Party‑aligned positions, silence criticism, or pass along information. These coercive tactics are often deliberately obscured, making them difficult for local authorities or community organisations to detect, let alone counter.
Third, the CCP employs a wide spectrum of incentives. These include commercial benefits, political access, or opportunities for personal advancement. Yet these promises often come with expectations: that local officials will support PRC‑backed initiatives, that academic partners will share research, or that community leaders will echo narratives favourable to Beijing.
The CCP does not distinguish between national and subnational targets. State legislatures, municipal governments, school boards, public universities, local businesses, and community associations are all soft targets. A strategic investment pitch to a mayor, a partnership with a local university, or outreach to diaspora civic groups can yield long-term advantages for the CCP’s objectives. Because these engagements often occur far from Washington, they can unfold with limited oversight, inconsistent safeguards, and uneven awareness of the risks involved.
This gap between federal insight and local exposure represents one of our most significant vulnerabilities. Closing it requires sustained collaboration across all levels of government. Federal agencies must share actionable intelligence, and best practices with state and local partners in ways that are clear, accessible, and timely. Local leaders—from mayors to university administrators to community officials—must be equipped with guidance that helps them distinguish legitimate engagement from attempts at manipulation or exploitation.
Above all, our response must reflect the same “whole‑of‑society” approach that the CCP employs. Protecting our economic competitiveness, safeguarding our research, and strengthening the resilience of our communities requires participation from government, industry, academia, civil society, and diaspora communities. The goal is to have honest and open cultural and economic exchange, that is transparent, secure, and mutually beneficial.
Today’s hearing will highlight the CCP’s continuing abuse of the United States’ sovereignty, and the divergence between the CCP’s words and deeds. The hearing will focus on two fronts of this battle that demand action from Washington: the CCP’s economic espionage, and its malign influence at the state level.
More importantly, we hope that today’s hearing will provide an important step toward building that coordinated, nationwide response.