Senator Marco Rubio warned Miami mayor Francis Suarez that the Chinese Communist Party is continuing its efforts to influence local government officials. While there has been previous concern about Chinese influence efforts at the state and municipal levels, Rubio’s letter this week to Suarez, the president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, followed a recent incident in his city.
Rubio wrote:
This outreach is often subtle. For example, just last week, Miami Beach City posted on social media that its deputy city manager gave CGTN America a tour of the city’s climate resiliency efforts, while CGTN featured multiple interviews with Miami Beach City’s leadership. CGTN America is a subsidiary of China Global Television Network, the international division of China Central Television, which is owned and controlled by the Propaganda Department of the CCP.
What seemed like a harmless publicity tour was actually much more. It was very likely the beginning of a long-term effort by China to build a relationship with Miami Beach City’s leadership responsible for important operations in one of the nation’s fastest growing cities.
While it should have been obvious that CGTN was a Chinese government actor, other relationships are less clear. For example, the U.S. Heartland China Association is formally an independent non-government organization based in the United States, but it routinely partners with organizations affiliated with the CCP’s United Front Work Department, which is tasked with gathering intelligence on and influence leaders outside of China. In addition, the People’s Republic of China’s 2017 National Intelligence Law makes clear that “any [Chinese] organization or citizen shall support, assist and cooperate with the state intelligence work.” A 2014 law makes clear Chinese companies and citizens “may not refuse.”
Then–Secretary of State Mike Pompeo warned about these efforts in a landmark 2020 address to the National Governors’ Association. He told the gathering of governors that, “I’d be surprised if most of you in the audience have not been lobbied by the Chinese Communist Party directly.”
The presence of Chinese state media in Florida is relatively robust compared with some other states. According to an analysis by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, four Florida-based media outlets participated in a Chinese state media-backed national forum in 2019. That gathering, which took place in China, was backed by the party’s United Front political-influence bureau.
Why Chinese influence campaigns target state and local officials is pretty straightforward, as FDD explained in the same report, which was published last year: “Beijing understands that subnational political leaders respond to different incentives than do federal officials and authorities — and that those incentives may create favorable conditions for China’s influence campaigns.”
That could range from securing preferential commercial deals to convincing state legislators and chief executives to go along with the party’s position on everything from U.S.–China trade to Taiwan and the Uyghur genocide.