“It was heart-wrenching to see my aging parents suffer from this targeted repression,” Hui told me. “I felt guilty for bringing this on them.”
Hui’s case is an example of what the FBI describes as transnational repression — when authoritarian governments such as those in Russia, Iran, Belarus, and China hire people to intimidate, harass, or spy on dissidents in the United States. China’s surveillance network is considered one of the largest and best resourced. A recent investigation led by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, an independent network of hundreds of reporters around the world, found evidence that in recent years Beijing had targeted dissidents like Hui in 23 countries.
For years, the United States was a global leader in countering this kind of repression on American soil. But that commitment appears to be wavering under the Trump administration.
In February, the Justice Department quietly dismantled its Foreign Influence Task Force, a unit that had for years investigated harassment by foreign governments on US soil, arguing that resources should focus instead on “more pressing priorities.” The FBI’s work monitoring suspected Chinese agents is also likely to be hampered by the agency’s new focus on immigration, The New York Times has reported.
Glenn Tiffert, a distinguished research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution who focuses on Beijing’s influence operations, said the administration’s actions signal that it does not consider transnational repression a priority. “It may make people who are acting as foreign agents even bolder,” he said.
The administration’s freeze of US Agency for International Development funding has also forced nonprofit groups like Freedom House, a leading watchdog organization that documents transnational repression, to shut down most programs. “The cancellation of this and related programs will set back the United States’ efforts to prevent authoritarian actors from attacking and intimidating people living in democratic nations,” Freedom House warned.
Experts say the Chinese Communist government has become adept at hiring agents in the United States who fly under the radar of American authorities. Chinese embassies and consulates run so-called “consular protection volunteer” networks in the United States and other countries that gather information on Chinese immigrant communities. Since 2016, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has provided training for some of those “volunteers.”
“The Chinese government prefers the plausible deniability of recruiting people who appear to be ordinary citizens and residents, as they can present themselves as simply expressing personal opinions,” Tiffert said.
Those recruits observe and report back to Beijing about the activities of dissidents in the United States — and sometimes harass them. Joey Siu is another Hong Kong pro-democracy activist who fled to the United States in 2020 and now faces an arrest warrant back home. Since that warrant was issued in 2023, Siu, who lives in exile in Washington, D.C., has received dozens of threatening emails and social media messages.
“ I tried reporting them, blocking them, but it just wouldn’t stop,” she said.
American prosecutors argued that Liang Litang, a 65-year-old naturalized American from China, worked as an agent of the Chinese government in the Boston area. He was cleared of US charges in February.
In August 2019, Hui, then an Emerson College student, organized a rally in downtown Boston to support efforts in Hong Kong to fight a bill that would have made it easier to extradite critics of the Chinese government in Hong Kong to China. Little did she know that Liang was observing the rally. Court documents later showed that he exchanged at least five calls with two Chinese officials during the event and took photographs of participants, including her.
“I didn’t even notice him at the rally,” Hui told me.
Liang, it turns out, was also being watched by US officials. In 2023, he was arrested on charges of acting as an illegal agent of the Chinese government. He would eventually stand trial in federal court in Boston.
Federal charging documents alleged that Liang acted as an agent of the Chinese government for years. He cofounded the New England Alliance for the Peaceful Unification of China, whose mission was to make Taiwan part of China. He organized events at the direction of the Chinese government, including a counterprotest against pro-democracy dissidents; met several times with Chinese officials; and hung Chinese flags in Boston’s Chinatown, court records alleged.
Perhaps more significantly, he provided photos and videos of pro-democracy dissidents in Boston to Chinese officials based in New York. He also identified potential recruits to a Chinese man listed in Liang’s contacts under “DC Ministry of Public Security Shanghai,” according to the federal indictment. The indictment said that the ministry “is tasked with investigating political dissidents.”
In February, a federal jury acquitted Liang. On the day of the verdict, he told news reporters outside the federal courthouse in Boston: “I love my ancestral home, China. And I love the USA. I’m innocent.”
The US attorney’s office in Boston declined to comment on the verdict.
Legal experts say there is no clear legal definition of “acting as a foreign agent,” making it hard for juries to hold individuals accountable. Still, a few cases have led to convictions. One of those involved a Berklee School of Music student who was convicted of stalking and threatening a Chinese woman who promoted democracy in China.
Liang did not respond to a request for comment for this article. During the trial, his lawyer, Derege Demissie, argued that the federal government had merely showed Liang to be a motivated and spontaneous activist whose political views happened to align with those of the Chinese government. In a recent interview, Demissie acknowledged that Liang had communicated with several Chinese officials but denied that he worked for the Chinese government.
But Liang’s acquittal has had a chilling effect on dissidents. Several told the Globe that they felt less confident the US government could protect them from being harassed or spied upon by the Chinese government.
Che Chungchi, a 75-year-old Chinese American, told me he is “afraid to live in Boston” and has avoided visiting Chinatown in the wake of Liang’s acquittal. Che’s image in photos and videos was sent to Chinese officials by Liang, according to the indictment. “I have to protect myself,” he said.
While Hui said she respected the jury’s decision in the Liang case, she worries about whether dissidents facing surveillance, harassment, and worse will have any recourse to seek justice or protection from the US government.
Still, when compared to her fellow activists in Hong Kong who are in prison and have little hope of receiving a fair trial, Hui believes the prosecution of Liang was an important step forward in exposing the harassment of Chinese and Hong Kong dissidents in the United States.
The Chinese government “thinks they could do these things to silence and break us,” Hui said. “But they have only made me stronger.”
