Eileen Wang, the mayor of Arcadia, Calif., resigned from her post on May 11, 2026, after being charged with working for the Chinese government. Screenshot via Arcadiaca.gov
The mayor of a Southern California city abruptly resigned Monday after federal prosecutors accused her of secretly advancing the interests of the Chinese government, including publishing propaganda through a website that purported to serve the local Chinese American community.
Former Arcadia Mayor Eileen Wang was charged in federal court with acting as an illegal agent “at the direction and control” of the People’s Republic of China between late 2020 and 2022, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California. The news release said Wang is expected to plead guilty in the next few weeks.
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Hours after the charge was announced on Monday, the city of Arcadia updated its website to state that Wang “resigned” from the mayor’s office and her position on the City Council effective May 11.
“At its next meeting, the City Council will select a Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem from among the remaining Councilmembers and will begin discussing how Arcadia’s District 3 will be represented until the next election cycle in November 2026,” the website said in its update.
Prosecutors said Wang worked alongside Yaoning “Mike” Sun, a Chino Hills political operative who was sentenced earlier this year to four years in federal prison in a related foreign-agent case. According to Wang’s plea agreement, the pair operated a website called U.S. News Center that presented itself as a local Chinese-language news outlet while allegedly distributing pro-Beijing messaging provided directly by Chinese officials.
Prosecutors cited an example from a June 2021 WeChat group message in which a Chinese government official circulated prewritten articles defending China’s policies in Xinjiang, including a statement that said “there is no genocide in Xinjiang” and no “forced labor” tied to cotton production. Minutes later, prosecutors alleged, Wang reposted the material to her own website and sent the official a link. The official replied: “So fast, thank you everyone.”
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Wang also allegedly edited an article at the request of a Chinese official and later sent a screenshot showing it had received more than 15,000 views, according to Monday’s press release. After the official responded “Great!” Wang allegedly responded, “Thank you leader.” The case also pulls in allegations tied to John Chen, a California businessman sentenced in 2024 in New York after pleading guilty to acting as an unregistered Chinese agent and participating in a bribery scheme targeting the Shen Yun Performing Arts organization and Falun Gong practitioners.
Wang communicated in 2021 with Chen, described by prosecutors as a “high-level member of the PRC intelligence apparatus” who had attended elite Chinese Communist Party events and met personally with Chinese President Xi Jinping, the news release said. In one message cited by prosecutors, Wang allegedly asked Chen to share an article from her site, writing: “This is what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wants to send.”
FBI officials described the case as part of a continuing counterintelligence crackdown targeting covert foreign influence operations in the United States.
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“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 leading the FBI’s Los Angeles field office, in the news release. “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.”