Arcadia Mayor Pleads Guilty to Acting as Chinese Agent
Eileen Wang, the former mayor of Arcadia, California — a wealthy Los Angeles suburb known as the “Chinese Beverly Hills” — has pleaded guilty to acting as an illegal foreign agent for the People’s Republic of China, federal prosecutors announced. Wang, 58, admitted to operating a propaganda website alongside her fiancé at the direction of Chinese government officials, in a case that has raised alarm about Beijing’s influence operations targeting local U.S. officials.
The Charges and Plea
Wang pleaded guilty to one felony count of acting in the United States as an illegal agent of a foreign government, a charge that carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison, according to the Department of Justice. She resigned from her position as mayor and from the Arcadia City Council on May 11, the same day the plea agreement was unsealed.
Federal prosecutors said that from late 2020 through 2022 — before Wang was elected to the city council in November 2022 — she and her fiancé, Yaoning “Mike” Sun, 65, operated a website called “U.S. News Center” that purported to be a news source for the local Chinese American community but was actually used to disseminate pro-PRC propaganda.
A Coordinated Propaganda Operation
According to court documents, Wang and Sun received and executed directives from PRC government officials via the encrypted messaging app WeChat. In one instance detailed by prosecutors, a PRC official sent Wang an essay defending China’s position on Xinjiang in June 2021. Wang posted it to her website within minutes and received a reply from the official: “So fast, thank you everyone.”
In August 2021, Wang edited an article at a PRC official’s request and shared a screenshot showing it had been viewed 15,128 times. The official responded with praise, and Wang replied, “Thank you leader,” as NPR reported.
By November 2021, Wang was communicating directly with John Chen, a high-level member of the PRC intelligence apparatus who had met personally with President Xi Jinping. Wang urged Chen to post an article from her website, writing: “This is what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wants to send.” Chen was later sentenced to 20 months in federal prison.
A Pattern of Influence
Nicholas Eftimiades, a former senior U.S. intelligence officer specializing in Chinese espionage, told NPR that Wang’s case exemplifies Beijing’s “whole of society” approach to influence operations. Unlike Western intelligence agencies that focus on military and government targets, China recruits individuals at all levels — including local politicians — with the long-term goal of cultivating influence.
“We’ve certainly seen a number of cases of China attempting to recruit lower level officials on long term approaches so that they can conduct covert influence on the United States,” Eftimiades said.
Wang’s fiancé, Sun, is already serving a 48-month federal prison sentence after pleading guilty in October 2025 to acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government. Prosecutors said Sun surveilled the then-president of Taiwan during a visit to Southern California in 2023.
The City’s Response
Arcadia, a city of approximately 55,000 residents where nearly 59% of the population is Asian and over 46% are foreign-born, was shaken by the revelations. City officials said they conducted an internal review of Wang’s actions in December 2024, when Sun was initially arrested, and found no interference with city operations.
“These are serious charges for our community, and we understand that this is unsettling news for a lot of our local Arcadia residents, as well as the idea of foreign interference in local public office,” Deputy City Manager Justine Bruno told NPR.
City Manager Dominic Lazzaretto added in a statement that “the allegations at the center of this case, that a foreign government sought to exert influence over a local elected official, are deeply troubling.”
Defense and Next Steps
Wang’s attorneys, Brian Sun and Jason Liang, issued a statement attributing her actions to personal circumstances, saying “events in Ms. Wang’s personal life — including her trust and love for apparently the wrong person who ultimately led her astray — require her to step away from public service.” They noted that her illegal activities occurred before she was elected to office.
Federal prosecutors rejected that framing. “Individuals in our country who covertly do the bidding of foreign governments undermine our democracy,” First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said in a statement. “This plea agreement is the latest success in our determination to defend the homeland against China’s efforts to corrupt our institutions.”
Wang was released on a $25,000 bond and ordered to surrender all passports and travel documents. A sentencing hearing has not yet been scheduled.
Broader Implications
The case has highlighted the vulnerability of local governments to foreign influence operations, particularly in communities with large immigrant populations. Experts say it also underscores China’s strategy of leveraging diaspora communities to spread propaganda and cultivate political influence abroad, raising questions about what other similar operations may remain undetected.