Justice Department accuses five people of intimidating Chinese dissidents in the United States

On Wednesday, federal prosecutors accused five individuals of intimidating and harassing Chinese dissidents living in the United States, including a congressional candidate from New York.

• “The complaints unsealed today reveal the outrageous and dangerous lengths to which the P.R.C. government’s secret police and these defendants have gone to attack the rule of law,” New York–based U.S. attorney Breon Peace stated in the report.
• One of the complaints alleged that a Chinese citizen by the name of Qǐmíng Lín 林启明 hired a private investigator to “disrupt the campaign” of a former U.S. Army member who participated in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests. The candidate was not identified in court documents, but fits the description of Brooklyn-based Xióng Yàn 熊焱, who is running in the Democratic primary for New York’s 1st Congressional district, per Politico.
• Other targets included Arthur Liu, a lawyer and political activist in the San Francisco Bay area, as well as the father of the Olympic figure skater Alysa Liu.

Three defendants “planned to destroy the artwork of a PRC national residing in Los Angeles that was critical of the PRC government, and planted surveillance equipment in the artist’s workplace and car to spy on him from the PRC,” according to the DoJ.

• The artwork in question appears to be this sculpture of Xi Jinpjng’s head as a coronavirus in a sculpture park next to a California highway, as documented by New York Times journalist Paul Mozur.

The cases expose attempts by Beijing “to suppress dissenting voices within the United States…and attempts to stalk, intimidate and silence those who oppose them,” Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen told a news conference on Wednesday.

• The Justice Department “remains focused on the actions of the P.R.C. government and its agents — not the Chinese people or those of Chinese descent, who are often the victims of these crimes,” Olsen stated.
• Last month, Olsen led the abandonment of the China Initiative, the Trump-era Justice Department program that faced widespread criticism for stoking anti-China sentiment and discrimination against people of Chinese origin.
• Similar cases were filed by the Justice Department nearly two years ago, citing efforts by the Chinese government to infiltrate the United States and monitor and harass those considered political opponents of China.

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhào Lìjiān 赵立坚 urged the U.S. to stop “smearing against China” and “​​abandon the Cold War mentality and ideological bias” when asked by the Associated Press on the matter.