China doesn't need spies when it has 501(c)(3)s. Congress is now forcing that argument into the open. The House Ways and Means Committee issued subpoenas on Sunday to three American nonprofits — BreakThrough News, Tricontinental, and The People's Forum — compelling them to hand over documents they've been withholding for months.
The man at the center of it all is Neville Roy Singham, a socialist megadonor who relocated to Shanghai and has funneled hundreds of millions through organizations that, on paper, look like American charities.
Chairman Jason Smith, R-Mo., didn't mince words about why the subpoenas were necessary. "For months, the Ways and Means Committee has been investigating how the Chinese Communist Party has been taking advantage of our country's laws through its tax-exempt sector to sow chaos and division here in the United States," Smith said.
Smith added that the subpoenas "will compel the production of the documents they have withheld for months and will help expose how America's tax laws and charitable sector may have been exploited to advance the CCP's influence operations inside the United States."
The People's Forum in particular operates as a fiscal sponsor for a web of progressive and radical organizations, essentially acting as a financial clearinghouse for groups that might not survive IRS scrutiny on their own.
James Fitzpatrick, Director of the Center to Advance Security in America, laid it out plainly: "People's Forum Inc. is the tax-exempt fiscal sponsor of many progressive and radical organizations." He went further, stating that "the many potentially illegal activities that People's Forum has engaged in are grounds for potential revocation of their tax-exempt charitable status."
The committee's investigation runs parallel to action from the Senate side. Senator Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman, sent a letter back in April flagging the same network. FBI Director Kash Patel, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, and U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton of the Southern District of New York are all connected to the broader enforcement picture, with potential violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act on the table.
FARA exists for exactly this situation — foreign governments using American organizations as front operations without disclosing the relationship. The fact that these groups stonewalled document requests for months before subpoenas became necessary tells you everything about their cooperation level.
Some will frame this as a political witch hunt targeting progressive nonprofits. That's an interesting defense for organizations financially linked to a man who chose to live in Shanghai while his money floods American activist groups that just happen to align with CCP strategic interests. Nobody's asking why a "charitable" network needs to hide its paperwork from Congress.
The CCP doesn't buy influence the way people imagine — no briefcases of cash in parking garages. They exploit the tax code, the nonprofit sector, and the good-faith assumption that American charitable organizations are actually charitable. They fund the infrastructure, train the activists, produce the media, and let the organizations do the rest under the protection of tax-exempt status.