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AOC and three other members of Congress paid off a Chinese foreign agent: Financial records show Democratic lawmakers handed over advertising cash to the US-based Hong Kong newspaper to help them with their election campaigns
- AOC and three other House members paid thousands of dollars to the Chinese newspaper Foreign Agent
- The money was spent as part of publicity for his 2022 re-election campaign.
- US newspapers Sing Tao were forced by the Department of Justice in August 2021 to register as a Chinese foreign agent
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and at least three other House members paid thousands in advertising costs to a Chinese newspaper classified by the Justice Department as a foreign agent.
It comes as tensions are reaching all-time highs between Washington and Beijing as the new GOP-controlled House focuses on tackling competition and the growing threat from China.
Ocasio-Cortez’s re-election campaign in her New York district spent nearly $1,500 advertising with Sing Tao Newspapers during the 2022 midterm elections, a Fox News Digital review of campaign finance records reveals.
Federal Election Commission (FEC) files show Rep. Grace Meng (DN.Y.) and Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (RN.Y.) and Kevin Mullin (D-Calif.) also reduced between $1,000 and $7,000 to various Sing Tao entities in re-election campaign advertising spending.
Sing Tao US is a subsidiary of Hong Kong-based Sing Tao News Corporation Ltd.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (DN.Y.) and three other lawmakers paid thousands of dollars in advertising for their 2022 midterm campaigns to a newspaper forced by the Justice Department to register as a Chinese foreign agent
The building of the US subsidiary of Sing Tao where the New York offices are located
The newspaper is considered pro-Beijing.
All four US campaigns spent ad spend on this Chinese-owned entity after it was forced by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to register as a Chinese foreign agent in August 2021.
China has increasingly entered the US radar as a primary adversary, specifically in terms of global competition and defense.
Beijing is mounting its anger at Washington with the politicians’ recognition of the autonomy of the island nation of Taiwan, which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has long claimed as its territory.
To counter these US claims, China has intensified its military exercises and operations in the South China Sea near the island.
More than half of the content of Sing Tao’s US operation is purchased from another Chinese company, Star Production (Shenzhen) Limited, according to Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) documents.
Sing Tao’s parent company operates Hong Kong’s oldest Chinese-language newspaper, and in June 2021, the daughter of a wealthy mainland Chinese property developer bought a majority stake, Axios previously reported.
Two months after the purchase, the Justice Department classified the company as a Chinese foreign agent.
Sing Tao’s US operations include newspapers in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco, as well as a radio station in Burlingame, California.
Sing Tao US has maintained that it is free from the CCP’s influence.
But the Council on Foreign Relations suggested this doesn’t matter because China has one of the “most restrictive media environments in the world, relying on censorship to control information in the news, online and on social media.”