Exposed: China-funded NGO accused of helping illegal aliens evade ICE — congressional investigation continues

China-linked sources have allegedly funded a nongovernmental organization that was accused of instructing illegal aliens on how to evade Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, according to a Tuesday report.

A Daily Caller News Foundation investigation discovered that Chinese government sources bankrolled the Chinese-American Planning Council, a nonprofit group founded in 1965. According to the organization’s website, it is dedicated to promoting “the social and economic empowerment of Chinese American, immigrant, and low-income communities.”

‘ICE’s efforts to enforce our immigration laws and remove illegal aliens from the country is the latest far-left cause that they appear to be exploiting in this effort.’

However, the NGO has previously been accused of helping illegal aliens evade immigration authorities and facilitating unlawful immigration with federal funding.

In April, Muckraker exposed footage that purportedly showed Carlyn Cowen, the CPC’s chief policy and public affairs officer, explaining how to avoid ICE agents.

“In the restaurant that I work at on the weekend, what we train everybody to do is if we see ICE come to the door, we actually enter a button in our [point of sale] system that says ‘la migra,’ and you click it, and then it prints a ticket to everywhere else in the restaurant so that everybody knows,” she stated, according to the undercover video. “No matter what kind of organization or business that you’re in, we have a few ways that you can get ready.”

In the recording, Cowen rattled off a list of methods to avoid ICE, including “hardening your physical space,” “identifying individuals that are authorized to respond if ICE comes to the door,” and “having a clear protocol.”

RELATED: Oversight Project exposes Democrat-aligned NGO’s ‘conspiracy’ to undermine immigration enforcement

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Photographer: Christopher Dilts/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The House Homeland Security Committee, led by Chairman Mark Green (R-Tenn.), responded to the leaked video by launching an investigation into CPC. According to the committee, 55% of the organization’s revenue comes from federal and state government grants.

CPC has maintained that it “fully adheres to all laws.”

“Our trainings do not direct anyone to do anything or to evade the law, but rather to inform participants of their constitutional rights, which they may choose to exercise,” Alice Du, CPC’s director of communications, told Documented.

According to the DCNF’s report, the CPC has received up to $445,969 in donations since 2018 from sources linked to the Chinese government.

These funds reportedly included nearly $10,000 in 2020 and up to that amount again in 2024 from the government-run Bank of China.

The investigation found that the Commercial Bank of China, also state-owned, donated a total of nearly $20,000 to the NGO from 2018 to 2023.

Additionally, the CPC reportedly receives yearly donations from the Bank of East Asia, based in Hong Kong, totaling up to $45,000 since 2018. The DCNF’s report noted that two of the institution’s leaders have served as delegates for the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, a political advisory body for the Chinese Communist Party.

The Charles B. Wang Community Health Center, a nonprofit and New York City-based health center, provided the CPC with as much as $229,993 since 2018.

Charles B. Wang, one of the health center’s major donors, has “frequently met with CCP influence and intel leaders in China,” the DCNF reported based on media reports.

Despite receiving nearly $700,000 since 2009 from the Charles B. Wang International Foundation, a spokesperson for the health center told the news outlet that it is not tied to Wang’s “associations with his other philanthropic efforts across the world.”

The CPC did not respond to requests for comment from the DCNF.

The investigation’s findings further raise concerns about China’s threat to U.S. national security.

Ira Mehlman, media director at the Federation for American Immigration Reform, told Blaze News, “It has been pretty clear for some time that fomenting social unrest and division in the United States has been the aim of the Chinese government.”

Mehlman explained that the Chinese government has been funding “a network of groups” based in the U.S.

“ICE’s efforts to enforce our immigration laws and remove illegal aliens from the country is the latest far-left cause that they appear to be exploiting in this effort,” he said.

Mehlman suggested thoroughly reviewing visas and NGO funding sources to reduce foreign influences.

“To the extent that the government can identify foreign nationals, be they Chinese or other, who are here under false pretenses as students or who have misrepresented their intentions on other types of visa applications, those visas should continue to be revoked, and the individuals expelled,” he explained. “Outside the scope of immigration policies, the government also needs to look into the funding sources for these groups and take appropriate action if these groups are acting on behalf of foreign governments.”

President Donald Trump’s administration has been implementing similar measures to reduce foreign influence and address the broader issues of illegal immigration. Attorney General Pam Bondi previously instructed the Department of Justice to investigate NGOs receiving federal funding. The New York Post reported that the Department of State revoked 4,000 foreign student visas over the first 100 days of Trump’s second term.

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