Lawmakers question whether Chinese influence have helped to fuel the chaos.
The FBI is investigating what’s fueling the riots against immigration enforcement in Los Angeles, said the agency’s director, Kash Patel.
“The FBI is investigating any and all monetary connections responsible for these riots,” Patel told The Epoch Times in response to rising concerns about possible Chinese influence behind the chaos.
One group backing the unrest is the Party for Socialism and Liberation, a communist political party linked to networks funded by pro-Beijing tech tycoon Neville Roy Singham.
The group has been posting updates about the riots on social media platform X, describing the arrests of illegal immigrants as a “war being waged on immigrant communities” while accusing the Immigration and Customs Enforcement of “kidnapping our neighbors, friends and families.”
One group closely allied with the Party for Socialism and Liberation is The People’s Forum, a Singham-funded organization based in Manhattan that has advocated for the ruling Chinese regime’s causes.
Co-executive director of The People’s Forum, Manolo de los Santos, a New York resident, has praised China’s COVID-19 policies, and the group has hosted events in Manhattan that hail the ascent of the Chinese Communist Party as a “decades-long epic battle that transformed not only China, but also the world,” according to a description on X.
The two organizations have been cross-posting on social media X in solidarity with the rioters. Both have been calling for more protests in their respective locales.
The People’s Forum, in an X post on the afternoon of June 10, asked people to gather in Manhattan’s Foley Square at 5 p.m. to “demand ICE get out of our communities.” A poster attached showed the Party for Socialism and Liberation, as well as Code Pink—an anti-war activist group that Singham’s wife, Jodi Evans, co-founded—as event endorsers.
SEE YOU IN NYC TODAY! 20 organizations have endorsed this emergency action to demand ICE OUT OF OUR COMMUNITIES. We stand with the people of Los Angeles and around the country who have courageously stood up against Trump and the attacks on immigrant families and whom are facing… pic.twitter.com/aPHF9DplmI
— The People's Forum (@PeoplesForumNYC) June 10, 2025
Evans began a campaign called “China Is Not Our Enemy” through Code Pink in 2020. She is also a contributor to The China Academy, a content platform that partners with Chinese state media and other Chinese state-linked entities to project Beijing’s narratives. One member of her group in March disrupted a February 2023 hearing by the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, waving a banner with the slogan “China is not our enemy.”
In July 2023, Singham attended a Chinese propaganda forum in Shanghai that aimed to promote the regime’s international image. He was seated next to speaker Zhou Zhan’an, who taught at the School of Marxism at China’s state-affiliated Fudan University, taking notes on a red-covered notebook, photos from the university show.
The People’s Forum has openly commented about its financing source and its ideological stance.
By Eva Fu
