Is the Chinese Communist Party guiding “progressive” groups in the United States to push CCP propaganda and anti-Semitism? That’s what the New York Times alleges in a recent bombshell investigation. Here’s what you need to know, what the Times missed, and why it matters.
As the authors write, U.S. millionaire and socialist benefactor Neville Roy Singham is running a “lavishly funded influence campaign” whitewashing China’s crimes, radicalizing America’s youth, and calling for the global allies of Hamas to unite and topple Israel as well as the United States. If that’s not bad enough, the driving force behind these attacks against our nation and close ally is the CCP’s media empire, with hefty donations from multiple sources, including Goldman Sach’s philanthropy fund.
Sadly, this story will not come as a surprise to students of history. Communist dictatorships have long laundered their propaganda through to proxies in the West while subjugating their own people. Cuba routinely funds radical groups and provides safe harbor to terrorists while jailing any who dare speak out about the abysmal conditions on the island. The Soviet Union treated Jews as second-class citizens at home while stoking racial hatred in the United States. And now, while China is carrying out what experts and democratic governments alike call a cultural genocide against the Uyghurs, the totalitarians in Beijing are pitting Americans against each other along racial and religious lines and funding groups seeking our destruction as a nation.
Recently, the People’s Forum (PF), a self-described “incubator for working class and marginalized communities to build unity across historic lines of division,” held workshops for the next generation of socialist revolutionaries in New York City. Speakers called for defeating “Israel and the U.S. empire” as participants were urged to “create the situation of chaos that is required of us in this moment of history.” (RELATED: The Left Is Weaponizing Fascism Against Trump)
PF co-executive director Manolo De Los Santos publicly exclaimed, “When we finally deal that final blow to destroy Israel, when the state of Israel is finally destroyed and erased from history, that will be the single most important blow we can give to destroying capitalism.”
Not so coincidentally, the PF is connected to the same CCP propaganda network exposed by the New York Times. The PF even shares office space with a Beijing media organization, where top donor and self-proclaimed communist Singham also conducts business.
During the PF’s recent workshop, its leaders proudly stated that “we study Lenin to make revolution.” That is a concerning statement given the history of communist revolutionary dictator Vladimir Lenin, who would have little doubt what the PF activists meant by “revolution.” It would look like the revolution Lenin himself implemented in 1917, which was characterized by 7 million dead and his infamous “hanging order” telegram calling for the murder of his class enemies (read oppressors, occupiers, etc.) by hanging and the taking of hostages — in other words, exactly what occurred in Israel on Oct. 7, and what the CCP and the PF seem to clearly support today.
On Capitol Hill in December, the House Committee on the Chinese Communist Party met on the topic of China’s information operations. The chairman, Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), articulated the challenge of China’s disinformation campaign against the West. “In Xi Jinping’s view, the war has already started on the most important battlefield: your mind,” he explained. “The CCP calls it cognitive domain warfare, part of their larger political warfare strategy.”
Unfortunately for the West, China’s information war has a real impact. As Beijing uses global flashpoints like Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attacks to further its malign agenda, the narratives the CCP is amplifying are contributing to a spike in anti-Semitism on college campuses and a 400 percent increase in reports of anti-Semitic incidents across the United States. Events like those held by the People’s Forum serve as instigators of anti-Semitism, not only fueling Jew-hatred but normalizing bigotry. Examples over the past many weeks include protests in New York and other major cities across the United States, where demonstrations against Israel also target American institutions. From transportation hubs to coffee shops to shopping malls to cancer treatment centers, the PF spreads its message of violence. Many say that anti-Semitism is only the first symptom of a society that fails to uphold liberal democratic values.
It’s past time to push back against China’s brazen attempts to divide America. Supporting a violent communist revolution, terror, and anti-Semitism has no place in a free and democratic society. When organizations that openly sympathize with communist and Marxist ideology gain the support of bedrock capitalist corporations, the long march through the institution’s pace quickens. Unfortunately, the ideologies that underpin PF’s mission will lead not to progress but rather to destruction, as lessons from Russia’s Bolshevik Revolution and China’s Cultural Revolution highlight.
Corporations, NGOs, non-profits, and educational institutions in the U.S. must be held accountable for funding and supporting organizations that call for violence and our country’s destruction.
Brandy Shufutinsky is the Director of Education and Community Engagement at the Jewish Institute for Liberal Values. Jennifer Richmond is the CEO of the Institute for Liberal Values. Ken Pope is the CEO of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation.
To learn more about communism and how it is impacting America today, sign up for the Institute for Liberal Values and the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation’s upcoming course, “Communism Exposed.”
