The Alliance for China’s Peaceful Reunification, USA, which played a role in organizing the protests, has deep ties to the CCP’s United Front Work Department.
The Alliance for China’s Peaceful Reunification, USA, which played a role in organizing the protests, has deep ties to the CCP’s United Front Work Department.
A reputed front group for the Chinese Communist Party played a role in U.S. protests against Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen when she visited New York and California in March and April, National Review has learned.
Web pages reviewed by NR indicate that the Alliance for China’s Peaceful Reunification, USA, put together an anti-Taiwan rally and helped organize transportation to the site of a demonstration in New York during Tsai’s visit. Experts linked that group to the CCP’s United Front Work Department, the powerful party agency tasked with shaping international attitudes toward China.
“That’s the nature of the CCP’s United Front Work [Department]: It’s astroturfed protests disguised as organic activism, and the foot soldiers ultimately take their cues from Beijing’s diplomats in Washington, New York, and California,” said Michael Sobolik, a fellow in Indo-Pacific studies at the American Foreign Policy Council.
Tsai first landed in New York on March 29, before traveling to South America and then finishing up her trip with a one-day stopover in Los Angeles on her way back to Taiwan. Her entourage was pursued by protesters for the entirety of the trip. Taiwanese media outlets such as the Liberty Times reported that the Chinese embassy had orchestrated the protests through local groups in New York and L.A., and that demonstrators were each paid hundreds of dollars. Taiwan’s intelligence chief, Tsai Ming-yen, confirmed the reports.
According to a Taiwanese government-backed news channel and Chinese state media, some 500 pro-Beijing demonstrators, in addition to crowds of Tsai’s fans, greeted the president in New York.
Speaking at the protest site in an interview with Chinese state broadcaster CGTN, Hua Junxiong, who was identified as honorary president of the Alliance for China’s Peaceful Reunification, said: “The anti-China and China-hate policy as well as the strategy of relying on the U.S. to seek independence will inevitably force Taiwan into a dangerous situation of war. So we strongly protest against Tsai Ing-wen’s U.S. stopover.”
Hua’s group played a leading role in organizing the effort in New York, its website strongly suggests. In a post on March 28, ACPR USA described a press conference that it had convened in Flushing, Queens, to oppose Tsai’s visit. “Trouble-Maker is not welcome here,” read a banner at the front of the room in an accompanying photo. According to the summary of the meeting posted to the website, people from 98 different pro-Beijing groups attended the event.
The web page also gave instructions for people interested in participating in the protest, directing them to either go on their own or meet the following day across the street from a Flushing hotel, where a chartered car would pick them up and return them afterward. It’s not clear who paid for the car service.
A subsequent post on the ACPR USA website on April 4 featured pictures of local groups participating in the demonstrations that took place in Los Angeles and at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., where Tsai met members of Congress. The website does not indicate that ACPR itself participated in that protest.
Russell Hsiao, the executive director of the Global Taiwan Institute, told NR that ACPR USA has national reach. “The ACPR USA serves a coordinating function for the various associations for China’s peaceful unification [ACPUs] operating across the country,” he said.
The organizing role that ACPR USA plays is significant because, while it depicts itself as an independent civic organization, there are indications that it answers to the United Front Work Department, and it has shown itself to have a relationship with Chinese diplomats posted to the U.S.
One indication of this, Hsiao said, is that ACPR USA honorary president Hua was also identified in Chinese state-media reports about the protests as an honorary president of the China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful National Reunification (CCPPNR). That umbrella entity was founded in China under the auspices of the United Front Work Department to promote Beijing’s designs on Taiwan, via chapters in over 90 countries or territories around the world. Its deputy secretary general, Lu Xiaofeng, spoke at ACPR’s 2022 conference.
Hsiao also said that some of ACPR USA’s senior leadership overlaps with that of another UFWD-connected group, the National Association for China’s Peaceful Reunification (NACPU), which operates in the Washington, D.C., area. Hua, for instance, is also called a senior advisor to the NACPU on its website.
The State Department officially designated NACPU — which then-secretary Mike Pompeo referred to as a “UFWD-controlled organization” — as a foreign mission of China in 2020, thus subjecting it to stringent requirements applied to other Chinese government entities. However, Hsiao added that the NAPCU and ACPR USA seem to be separate organizations, and that the State Department designation does not automatically apply to ACPR USA, though “the basis of the NACPU could potentially support such a designation for ACPR.” In his comments to NR, Sobolik called on Secretary of State Antony Blinken to apply the same designation to ACPR.
For its part, the State Department declined to comment on ACPR USA’s role in the protests and State’s current view of United Front Work Department organs operating on U.S. soil. Neither ACPR USA nor the Chinese embassy responded to requests for comment.
ACPR USA also has ties to Chinese diplomats in the U.S. In 2019, Xu Xueyuan — who is currently China’s most senior diplomat in the U.S. — spoke at ACPR’s annual meeting, according to the embassy website. And two years later, Hua was invited to deliver a speech at an online celebration of China’s national day hosted by Chinese consul-general Huang Ping, who often rubs shoulders with New York politicians. In addition to Hua, New York City mayor Eric Adams and Philadelphia mayor Jim Kenney took part in the celebration, the consulate’s website says.
“Based on the visibility of the PRC Embassy and CCPPNR’s involvement in these organizations’ activities, both are actively involved in both the ACPR and NACPU’s programs and, as for the local ACPUs, [they] receive guidance from the CCPPNR and likely the PRC Embassy as well,” said Hsiao, pointing noting that the two U.S. groups are featured on the overall CCPPNR’s website, where they are described as its affiliates.
The Chinese embassy attempted to leverage the protests in a last-ditch messaging effort to convince members of Congress not to meet Tsai. In letters to the members, which NR first reported on ahead of the meeting, a diplomat claimed that the New York demonstration “fully reflects the will of the people.”