Is anyone surprised? Hands?

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LOS ANGELES – The mayor of Arcadia has been charged in federal court with acting as an illegal agent of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), the Justice Department announced today.

Eileen Wang, 58, of Arcadia, is charged via information with one count of acting in the United States as an illegal agent of a foreign government.

In a related filing, Wang has agreed to plead guilty to the felony count, which comes with a statutory maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison.

She is expected to make her initial appearance this afternoon in United States District Court in downtown Los Angeles. Wang is expected to plead guilty in the coming weeks.

Wang was elected in November 2022 to the Arcadia City Council, a five-person governing body from which the mayor is selected on a rotating basis.

“Individuals in our country who covertly do the bidding of foreign governments undermine our country,” said First Assistant United States Attorney Bill Essayli. “This plea agreement is the latest success in our determination to defend the homeland against China’s efforts to corrupt our institutions.”

“Individuals elected to public office in the United States should act only for the people of the United States that they represent,” said Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg. “It is deeply concerning that someone who previously received and executed directives from PRC government officials is now in a position of public trust at all, but particularly so because that relationship with that foreign government had never been disclosed.”

“By her own admission, Eileen Wang secretly served the interests of the Chinese government,” said Assistant Director Roman Rozhavsky of the FBI’s Counterintelligence and Espionage Division. “Let this serve as a clear warning: Individuals who act on behalf of foreign governments to influence our democracy will be identified, investigated, and brought to justice. Protecting the rule of law and the transparency of our democratic process remains at the core of the FBI’s mission, and we will continue working alongside our partners to safeguard the integrity of our elections and keep hostile actors from undermining the voices of the American people.”

"All Americans should be alarmed to learn an elected official was brazenly spreading propaganda on behalf of the Chinese government," said Patrick Grandy, the Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI's Los Angeles Field Office. "The FBI is dedicated to rooting out those illegally acting as agents of a foreign government as they do the bidding of America’s adversaries."

According to her plea agreement, from late 2020 through 2022, Wang and Yaoning “Mike” Sun, 65, of Chino Hills, worked at the direction and control of PRC government officials and coordinated with U.S.-based individuals to promote the PRC’s interests by, among other things, promoting pro-PRC propaganda in the United States. Sun is serving a four-year federal prison sentence after he pleaded guilty in October 2025 to acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government.

More:
https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/arcadia-mayor-federally-charged-acting-illegal-agent-peoples-republic-china