Conspiracy theories fracture Chinese dissident community abroad, find footing among those who support Donald Trump

[Feng Leng]

Conspiracy theories fracture Chinese dissident community abroad

Misinformation amplified on Chinese language social media, in chat groups and video blogs has found a footing among the pro-Trump Chinese community abroad.

www.scmp.com

• Misinformation amplified on Chinese language social media, in chat groups and video blogs has found a footing among the pro-Trump Chinese community abroad
• Prominent members have rallied behind Trump’s failed efforts to overturn his electoral defeat

The tempestuous weeks following Joe Biden’s election as US president gave rise to numerous fact-free conspiracy theories. Among them: a claim the CIA director was captured by US special forces and flown to Guantanamo Bay to face charges relating to election interference; weeks later, an accusation that left-wing activists conspired with police officers to orchestrate the deadly January 6 attack on the US Capitol.

Of the many corners of Donald Trump’s support base where this tsunami of misinformation has found a willing audience, one contingent has stood out: pro-democracy Chinese dissidents living overseas.

Amplified on Chinese language social media, in chat groups and video blogs, such claims have found a footing in a community ostensibly unified by a reverence for democratic norms, but which has seen numerous prominent members rally behind Trump’s failed efforts to overturn his electoral defeat.

Other members of the dissident community are growing increasingly worried that misinformation and disinformation – and their peers’ embrace of it – is fracturing the group in ways that will be near impossible to undo.

“The pro-democracy movement now has basically got to a point where it cannot recover,” said Washington-based activist Yang Jianli, who believes that his peers’ endorsement of Trump’s unproven claims of election fraud is further marginalising a community that has rarely taken centre stage in US politics.

Prominent members of the dissident community who have thrown their weight behind Trump’s claims of a stolen election include Chen Guangcheng, the legal activist who in 2012 escaped house arrest in China and subsequently left the country with the help of US diplomats.

To his 117,000 followers on Twitter, Chen has shared posts painting Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol as left-wing infiltrators, a bogus report that a Philadelphia mobster manufactured 300,000 false ballots for Biden in Pennsylvania, and conspiracy theories that voting information was stored on overseas servers.

Like a number of other dissidents who have amplified similar narratives, Chen did not respond to a request for comment.

“They don’t care [that] supporting Trump is almost the same thing as destroying democracy here,” said Yang, who partly attributes support for Trump within the dissident community to the former president’s hardline approach to Beijing.

Yang, who founded the Washington-based Citizen Power Initiatives for China advocacy group after fleeing China in 2007, has in recent months found himself the subject of misinformation spread by his detractors, many doing so behind anonymous Twitter accounts.

Smears against Yang, 57, have centred on the fact his application for US citizenship was recently rejected over his prior membership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). “Many people are targeting me with rumours that the US is about to deport me,” said Yang, who continues to hold permanent residency.

A November Tweet by him criticising then-secretary of state Mike Pompeo for refusing to acknowledge Biden’s victory unleashed a torrent of similarly vitriolic comments – many in Chinese – accusing Yang of spreading “lies” on behalf of the Democrat party or acting as a CCP operative.

“How does opposition of Trump automatically mean supporting the CCP?” Yang said of his critics’ rationale. “I don’t understand how one can draw that equals sign.”

Beyond Twitter, many point to YouTube as one of the most active digital arenas in which misinformation has spread among the Chinese diaspora’s pro-Trump, anti-CCP contingent.

On a daily basis, countless vloggers take to the site to post videos, normally in monologue form, expounding on a mixture of real events, conspiracy theories, conjecture and their own analysis.

One vlogger is California-based Wu Jianmin, a self-described participant in China’s pro-democracy movement of 1989, whose YouTube rants against perceived enemies of Trump regularly draw more than 50,000 views.

In a January 14 video, Wu said that it was members of Antifa – a leaderless anti-fascist movement – who were responsible for the storming of the Capitol, accusing without evidence that they coordinated with Capitol police to let crowds of Trump supporters into the complex. “Even CNN, the most anti-Trump, left-wing outlet, reported yesterday that, according to their understanding, we can be sure that the Capitol attack was a premeditated, purposeful and planned event [carried out by] part of the Antifa organisation,” Wu falsely told his viewers.

Contrary to a viral, crudely doctored screenshot of a CNN report, the outlet has not reported such claims. In fact, days before Wu’s video, it had published its own fact-checking article debunking the very same conspiracy theory, citing US Federal Bureau of Investigation denials of the claim.

YouTube in December announced it would start removing content promoting the claim that Trump lost the election due to widespread voter fraud. Google, which owns YouTube, did not respond to questions about its approach to handling Chinese-language misinformation published to its platform.

It is not always clear whether YouTubers like Wu spread untrue claims knowingly – amounting to disinformation – or truly believe the information they are sharing is true.

Either way, said Rui Zhong, a programme associate at the Wilson Centre’s Kissinger Institute on China and the United States, “there’s a material incentive for people to keep saying what they’re saying”.

Wu’s followers, for instance, can pay for subscriptions providing privileges like direct communication with him. Like many of his fellow anti-CCP, pro-Trump YouTubers, a PayPal link sits prominently in each video description.

Wu, whose videos have been viewed some 92 million times, declined to comment.

Some have pointed to language barriers, particularly the lack of Chinese language fact checking sites and reliable news outlets, as part of the reason for the untethered spread of misinformation through the dissident community.

“Many of them living in the United States have been marginalised because they don’t have the language skills to understand what’s going in the US,” said Yang, adding that many instead rely solely on social media for their consumption of news.

One such avenue is WeChat, the Tencent-owned messaging app used widely within the Chinese diaspora.

Flow of misinformation within the app can be hard to track due to the fact that much of its transmission takes place within private chat groups. But even on public accounts, Chinese language posts by overseas-based, pro-Trump users containing misinformation about the election abound.

In one recent post applauding Trump for “persisting until the very end”, a US-based blogger wrote that the outgoing president had left a note for Biden in the Oval Office saying: “Joe, you know I won.” The false account of events appeared to take at face value a viral, doctored image of the letter, the true contents of which were never made public.

Such misinformation has prompted some efforts by other users to correct the record, including posts by Shanghai-based China Fact Check.

In a statement, a Tencent representative said that WeChat took addressing misinformation “seriously”, and provided users “with an easy way to report content or behaviour, as well as remove content that violates our policies and/or local regulations in the markets where we operate”.

Yet despite WeChat’s documented capacity to monitor and remove user content, much of the pro-Trump misinformation remains on the platform untouched. That is in part because its content surveillance apparatus tends to prioritise issues more directly related to China’s domestic political sensitivities, said Zhong.

“If somebody starts trashing Xi Jinping in a group chat, that group is getting sealed,” said Zhong. “[But] they will not do a lot of due diligence in looking through groups to stop 2020 election [misinformation] that strictly.”

Regardless of the means by which it is spread, pro-Trump misinformation has found a receptive audience within the dissident community in part thanks to the prevailing right-of-centre beliefs held by many of its members, said observers.

Evangelical Christian Chinese members of the community who came to the US in the 1990s onwards, for instance, might become “really passionate” about anti-abortion or LGBTQ issues in the country, said Zhong. China, she said, was but “one of a portfolio of policy issues that these people care about”.

Teng Biao, a Jersey-based human rights activist and one of a few vocal Trump critics among prominent US-based dissidents, said pro-Trump misinformation suits what many dissidents “imagine the US to be, and suits their political beliefs”.

From gun ownership, abortion, immigration to race issues, “the majority of Chinese dissidents have conservative opinions – the same kind of opinions as Trump”, said Teng, 47, who worked as a human rights lawyer in China before fleeing in 2014.

Disagreement has always been a feature of the broad and leaderless coalition of pro-democracy activists overseas, said Teng, pointing in particular to debates that raged following the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, about the respective merits of reformism versus revolution.

But this time the fractures feel far deeper and potentially long lasting, said Teng. Without basic respect for the truth, he said, “the dissident community will be marginalised more and more.”

Amid the acrimony, Teng has been blocked on social media by a number of fellow activists and those he considered friends. And, like Yang, his criticism of Trump’s efforts to overturn the election has triggered online attacks from supporters of the former president, accusing him of being a CCP operative masquerading as a human-rights activist.

He has faced the same smears offline, too, in the form of protesters picketing outside his Princeton Junction home almost every day for more than five weeks this winter.

Teng believes the demonstrators are followers of Guo Wengui, the exiled Chinese billionaire and Steve Bannon ally who has railed against Teng and other Chinese dissidents in online videos, calling on followers to “eliminate” them.

In Guo, Teng sees the reflection of another billionaire with legions of devout followers: Trump. And both, said Teng, are engaging in “a war on truth, a war on facts”.

WSJ News Exclusive | Fundraising Feud Spurs Anger Among a Chinese Exile, His Followers and His Detractors

Guo Wengui, a Chinese businessman allied with former White House advisor Steve Bannon, is in an increasingly volatile fight with investors over a fundraising plan that has drawn scrutiny from banks and investigators.

www.wsj.com

Fundraising Feud Spurs Anger Among a Chinese Exile, His Followers and His Detractors

Guo Wengui, a close ally of Steve Bannon, harshly criticizes people demanding details of a fundraising effort that has drawn scrutiny

Pastry chef Jiamei Lu said she told the Federal Bureau of Investigation this summer that she was the victim of a financial fraud being run by a company linked to exiled Chinese businessman Guo Wengui and former White House political adviser Steve Bannon.

Ms. Lu said that after she met with FBI agents in New York, Mr. Guo lambasted her in an online video. Clutching a baseball bat, Mr. Guo called Ms. Lu a Chinese spy, describing her in vulgar terms. “You wait and see,” he said.

Ms. Lu says she was among the many people who sent money to invest in GTV, which according to Mr. Guo raised hundreds of millions of dollars this spring. Some of those people including Ms. Lu said they later became convinced they’d been defrauded and reported their concerns to authorities.

The company has come under investigation by the FBI, Securities and Exchange Commission and New York attorney general’s office, according to people familiar with the matter, while bank accounts linked to GTV’s fundraising have been frozen. In recent weeks, FBI agents have been asking witnesses questions specifically about Mr. Guo’s online statements, and the investigation is moving quickly, according to people familiar with the matter.

In a statement through his lawyer, Mr. Guo said, “I have never condoned any type of violence towards any individuals.” He said the baseball bat was a prop he had used in multiple videos.

 

[Feng Leng]

After John left a conspiracy-sharing group, the billionaire founder told followers he 'deserved to die'

Two men who worked in a propaganda machine led by Steve Bannon and billionaire Guo Wengui are speaking out about the tactics and motives behind the secretive conspiracy group.

www.abc.net.au

They once peddled misinformation for Guo Wengui and Steve Bannon. Now they're speaking out

In late September, a US-based Chinese YouTuber called Lude delivered a cryptic message to his 200,000 subscribers.

He said there were "three hard drives" that contained explosive materials about Hunter Biden, the son of presidential candidate Joe Biden.

It was alleged that the hard drives held evidence of Hunter Biden's secret deals in China and Ukraine, as well as sex tapes with graphic scenes of sexual abuse.

"A fellow fighter of our whistleblowers' movement got it," Lude said in his show.

Lude is part of a group of online influencers led by the controversial Chinese billionaire, Guo Wengui (also known as Miles Kwok) and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon.

Their "whistleblowers' movement", rebranded this year by the duo as The New Federal State of China, soon became the centre of Hunter Biden's laptop scandal.

The unverified videos and photos they posted allegedly showing Hunter Biden "engaging in sex and drug acts" have been watched by tens of millions of viewers, although most mainstream US media have not reported the allegations because the source and substance of the material could not be verified.

Former core members told the ABC the group is "very, very dangerous to any country", and the misinformation it recklessly spreads will seriously harm democracy.

"[Guo's media] is spreading misinformation. I think it's trying to interrupt the United State elections," said John Pan, a former core member of the group, speaking out for the first time.

Bannon and the billionaire

Guo Wengui is a fugitive from China who fled to the US in 2014 claiming political persecution.

He made his billions in property development in China, and in America runs media streaming platforms online.

Together with Steve Bannon, Mr Guo launched an aggressive anti-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) movement called the New Federal State of China in June this year, with branches in countries like the US, Canada, Taiwan, Japan, New Zealand and Australia.

Through a plethora of media channels, spot rallies, flyer and email spam campaigns, the movement has been instrumental in pushing out Mr Guo's conspiracy theories and misinformation.

However, his controversial tactics and role in spruiking a number of dangerous conspiracy theories has made critics question his real motives.

Mr Guo's company GTV Media Group is reportedly being investigated by the FBI and the Securities Exchange Commission.

His media partner, Mr Bannon, was arrested in August by US federal agents on fraud charges while on Mr Guo's yacht.

Yet, Mr Guo and his supporters have also maintained the appearance of a united front.

They called it "the whistleblowers' movement", a media campaign with an aim to "take down the CCP" by any means necessary.

Dr Anne Kruger, the director of Asia Pacific at the fact check organisation FirstDraft, studied the group's operations and said followers flood the internet with questionable material.

"Their main tactic is really to try to appeal to people that might have a gripe against the Chinese Communist Party and to push conspiracy theories," Dr Kruger said

While their content usually only circulates around Mr Guo's own media networks, there have been some instances where it crossed over to mainstream media.

One of the group's most successful campaigns popularised discredited claims by a virologist who said COVID-19 was deliberately manufactured in a Chinese lab.

More recently, FirstDraft's researchers found that Mr Guo's supporter's post about the Hunter Biden scandal from late September is the first traceable mention of the now-viral rumours.

In the following weeks, Guo's websites have been flooding the internet with the Hunter Biden rumours.

"The timing of this just weeks out from the election at a crucial time in the US [election] campaign, shows that this has been planned and there's been some coordination here to do maximum damage against the Biden campaign," Dr Kruger said.

"I guess it's not surprising when you see that they are very much anti-CCP and pro-Trump because that suits their political purposes."

Within hours of the release of the sex tapes allegedly of Hunter Biden, Twitter and Facebook suspended more than a dozen social media accounts controlled by Mr Guo's group.

A calculated political move

A former key insider from Guo's movement agrees that YouTuber Lude's release of incriminating but unverified material from Hunter Biden's laptop was a calculated political move.

"Lude is the number one propogandist for Guo Wengui. His channel is today supported by Guo Wengui," said John Pan, who was amongst Mr Guo's inner circle until December 2019.

Mr Pan is a Brisbane-based Chinese migrant-turned-dissident who came to Australia in 2010.

In recent years, he started his own YouTube channel, where he hosts political debates about Chinese politics and human rights issues.

As a human rights advocate, Mr Pan was immediately fascinated by Guo Wengui's outlandish claims about officials' corruption in China.

"I think this person may be saying something important. I should support him," he said he thought at the time.

Mr Pan was referred to Mr Guo via a friend, and quickly became a core member of his inner circle, a group of Chinese dissidents and social media influencers.

This group, which started out with 18 members, discussed how to orchestrate viral media campaigns against the CCP.

"We're talking about how we would promote the information that Guo was leaking out, how we spread that information to the world. No matter [if it was] true or false," said Mr Pan.

Mr Pan says Mr Guo would usually share with the group "new information" about corruption in China and ask them to spread it across their networks.

Another one of Guo's favourite topics according to Pan, was outing Chinese individuals as "CCP spies".

For example, Mr Pan says Mr Guo instructed the group to out a Chinese woman and US resident as a CCP agent. There was no credible evidence to support Mr Guo's allegations.

Leaked audio from the core group's meetings also shows Mr Guo once encouraged his key followers during the Hong Kong democracy protests in 2019 to spread a rumour that martial law was imminent in the territory.

"The martial law command will impose massive restrictions on the movement of people in and out of Hong Kong … they will also clean up US and European institutions based in Hong Kong and foreigners with US and British passports," Mr Guo shared from a document he claimed to receive from a "reliable informant within the CCP".

As Mr Pan's videos' popularity skyrocketed, with some posts attracting tens of thousands of views, he also impressed the NY-based billionaire and Mr Bannon.

In a private message to Mr Pan, Mr Guo filmed Mr Bannon praising him and his show, and expressed his wish to make him a hero.

"I look forward to being on your show very shortly," Mr Bannon said to Mr Pan.

"I would love to host him when he comes, bring him to Washington and have him give a speech and make sure there is a big audience … you guys are really the heroes," Mr Bannon turned and told Mr Guo.

'Go, bomb the CCP bandit'

After witnessing the movement's dangerous tactics, Mr Pan became uncomfortable with its direction.

In late 2019, he decided to branch out and create his own charity to fight for human rights in Hong Kong and Xinjiang province.

A few days after having a conversation about it with Mr Guo, Mr Guo told his 1.4 million followers in his online broadcasts that Mr Pan was a "CCP spy", and urged them to attack him.

"He started calling me a fraud and a scam. A Chinese government spy. I should deserve to die," Mr Pan said.

"I can't sleep. I'm quite shocked. I had a panic attack."

On October 8 this year, a group of the online harassers picketed outside his house in Brisbane, waving flags and banners of the New Federal State of China and chanting slogans: "Kick the CCP agent out of Australia."

This incident frightened Mr Pan, who said his "whole body" was shaking.

The protesters have openly broadcast on social media they will return.

As recently as October 9, Mr Guo's organiser in Sydney published a call-out to Mr Guo's Australian followers to travel to Brisbane where Mr Pan lives, once the Queensland border restrictions are lifted, and "carry out the campaign to eliminate the traitor to the end".

Mr Pan's name is on a Guo hit list with about 10 other Chinese dissidents around the world.

Mr Guo recently launched on his livestream an "eliminate the traitors campaign", calling on his supporters to harm those on the list.

One of the dissidents has already been beaten up on the streets of LA.

Another, Texas-based pastor and human rights activist Bob Fu, told the ABC that he's had the bomb squad in Midland Texas searching his house for hidden explosives.

Mr Fu said he had no idea why he was being targeted by Mr Guo's group.

"What on Earth is this about? I have never done anything with him for him. We had no financial dispute. Nothing," Mr Fu said.

Mr Guo has made at least three livestream videos encouraging his followers to "eliminate Pastor Fu".

Fearing for his and his family's safety, Mr Fu rang local police and wrote to the FBI, saying:

"Urgent memo (October 21, 2020): Bomb threat at Guo's Media, mobilizing his followers to come to Midland TX to besiege my home. Then from around 5:57am images of special kind of dynamite were posted. The images were posted with the text message urging 'GO, BOMB CCP BANDIT.'"

After he contacted police, the bomb squad searched his house and the riot squad escorted Mr Fu's daughter from school.

Mr Fu and his family were sent to protective police custody. They are still residing in an undisclosed location.

"They publicly called for the … elimination of me and others on his hit list. I'm certainly worried for my family members and myself for our life," he said.

'I think he is a liar'

New York-based Chinese dissident and former land-grab protest leader Zhuang Liehong is another previous close affiliate of Mr Guo who has decided to speak out.

Mr Zhuang had appeared at the UN and US congresses to express his concerns about China's human rights records.

Mr Zhuang was introduced to Mr Guo in 2017 and worked with Mr Guo on a daily basis for about three months in 2019.

"He asked us to spread his bombshell revelations, most of them were unverifiable, but due to my disgust of the CCP, I chose to trust him," Mr Zhuang said.

Mr Zhuang said Mr Guo kept boasting about his "close contacts" in the White House.

"He always said he was meeting important people, to make us feel we are part of something big, and like we are influencing American politics," Mr Zhuang said.

"But I was there with him, I knew he was just looking at his phone, not meeting any politicians.

"I think he is a liar."

Mr Zhuang said he now regrets helping Mr Guo.

"I have seen who he truly is. He won't do anything that can truly help democracy," he said.

Both Mr Pan and Mr Zhuang are suing Mr Guo for defamation in US courts.

Mr Guo and his Australian-based representatives did not respond to ABC's request for comment.

Guo Wengui Is Sending Mobs After Chinese Dissidents

Steve Bannon’s billionaire funder claims to be a foe of the Chinese Communist Party, but his targets are fellow exiles.

foreignpolicy.com

Guo Wengui Is Sending Mobs After Chinese Dissidents

Steve Bannon’s billionaire funder claims to be a foe of the Chinese Communist Party, but his targets are fellow exiles.

A prominent Chinese dissident pulls his children from school and flees his Texas home. A California-based democracy activist faces days of threats and harassment from protesters gathered in his driveway. Both were targets on a hit list of dissidents released last month by the exiled Chinese businessman Guo Wengui, who has claimed without evidence they are spies from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

“Let’s eliminate traitors in the world,” a cigar-wielding Guo told his followers in a video posted online last month. “Let’s get started, let’s finish with these traitors first.”

In the days that followed, dozens of protesters have held daily demonstrations outside the Midland, Texas, home of Chinese pastor Bob Fu, a prominent figure among the evangelical Christians who make up a substantial number of U.S.-based Chinese dissidents. They have refused to say who they were or where they traveled from—one man outside Fu’s home identified himself to local media as “Texas Cowboy”—but have made it clear they are heeding Guo’s calls to go after the founder of the nonprofit ChinaAid, which provides legal assistance to Christians facing persecution in China.

The actions of Guo and his followers have drawn the attention of the FBI, rebukes from Sens. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, and a flurry of suspicion as to what the billionaire real estate magnate is actually up to.

“I think this is a very well-funded, directed, orchestrated, sophisticated smear campaign,” Fu told me after he and his family were placed in protective custody. He now alleges the CCP itself is behind the attacks. “Guo Wengui thinks he’s the Robin Hood organizing a private militia to do justice,” he said.

Foreign Policy reached out to Guo for comment, but his team, after saying they would translate the questions for Guo, failed to respond to further requests.

Accusations that others are really working for the CCP are not unknown in the bitterly contentious world of Chinese dissidents. That’s not surprising, given that the CCP genuinely does spend considerable amounts of time, money, and energy targeting such organizations, which it sees as a deep threat to its rule. But it can also mean personal enmities become political paranoias.

And yet, Guo’s background and actions raise uncomfortable questions. Guo was once a prominent player in the intertangled network of Chinese business and politics. But he fled China in 2015 after his patron, Vice Minister of State Security Ma Jian, fell, leaving him dangerously exposed. Since then he has attempted to frame himself as a principled critic of the CCP. Upon arriving in the United States, he formed an alliance with former Trump strategist and far-right operative Steve Bannon, who was arrested by federal agents on fraud charges while on Guo’s yacht off the shore of Connecticut in August. The pair launched a self-proclaimed government in exile, the New Federal State of China, and the media company GTV Media Group, which is reportedly being investigated by the FBI and the Securities and Exchange Commission.

GTV’s outlets have served as mouthpieces for Guo and Bannon to spread disinformation about the origin of the coronavirus and publish conspiracy theories about presidential candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden that have reportedly seeped into Trump’s inner circle and the newsroom of the New York Post. The outlets have also been used by Guo to smear dissidents such as Fu. In January, Guo’s GNews website published an article titled “About Bob Fu – A Fake Pastor” that meanders from severe allegations—unsubstantiated accusations of human trafficking and sexual harassment, which Fu denies—to screenshots of Texas properties allegedly owned by Fu’s relatives and critical Google reviews of a winery owned by Fu’s wife.

Fu still laughs at the absurdity of Guo’s claims, but he took them seriously.

“That was the start of when I thought, he is doing something real to threaten our family,” he said.

Outside of one trespassing incident, the Midland protests have remained peaceful and law-abiding, and Guo has said he does not condone violence. But they have inflamed lingering doubts about whether Guo Wengui is who he says he is.

Adrian Zenz, a senior fellow in China studies at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation who has known Fu for years, was cautious not to draw definitive conclusions but said Guo’s recent behavior, to him, “looks like an influence operation.”

It’s not the first time Guo’s loyalties have been questioned. Strategic Vision, a consultancy firm hired in 2018 by a company affiliated with Guo, accused him in court filings of being a “dissident-hunter” after being asked to investigate people Guo said had ties to top CCP officials. A lawyer for Guo has denied the claims

“Sending people to his house, that’s like a Communist Party pressure tactic,” Zenz said. “It really raises the question of who is Guo Wengui? Is he a CCP spy?”

The protests outside Fu’s house caused a stir in Midland, a Permian Basin oil town known for high school football rather than battles between Chinese dissidents. Small groups began congregating in Fu’s driveway on Sept. 26, when the pastor was at a Washington prayer service on the National Mall. The crowd grew to around 50 people on the morning of Oct. 5 as Fu spoke from home at a virtual United Nations Human Rights Council event. He and his family were escorted by Midland police to a safe location that day, but Guo’s followers canvassed the neighborhood and distributed flyers condemning the pastor and ChinaAid.

The town has not taken kindly to the newcomers. “Midlanders don’t do well or put up well with people who make threats, literally terrorist threats, against our citizens,” Mayor Patrick Payton told reporters earlier this month. An incensed Guo responded by threatening Payton in an online video, telling his followers: “We must make him pay.”

Payton has since said Midland police have not been able to determine if the protesters are working directly for Guo or whether they have been paid.

Fu has not been the only target. Wu Jianmin, a Chinese democracy activist in Southern California, said supporters of Guo showed up at his family’s home four times between Sept. 23 and Oct. 6. “They would park themselves outside my house on the curb, shouting insulting obscenities while [livestreaming] on Twitter,” he told me.

Like Fu, Wu said he had no prior connections to Guo before the billionaire and his followers began their pressure campaigns, but he believes Chinese authorities are “very aggravated” by his popular anti-CCP YouTube channel. “Only the CCP and its agents would desire [the] silencing of my voice,” he said.

Guo’s supporters say they are avowed anti-communists. His bizarre antics may be more a habit than a sign of any CCP connection; the world of Beijing real estate is full of dirty tricks, some of which, like faking documents, Guo is accused of having used in the past. He may effectively see Fu and other anti-CCP activists as rivals for funding and government backing in the United States.

Whatever Guo’s motives, his actions have already had a chilling effect. Fu became more worried after Chinese Christians he assisted in coming to the United States told him they had been contacted by apparent supporters of Guo. ChinaAid closed its offices in early October due to the threats. “Their purpose,” Fu said, “is to make me shut up.”

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

lol they paid millions to bring Chen into the US, and look how he repays them. Reality is stranger than fiction!