CENTER FOR AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS: Socialism In Arizona: Chinese Funded Activism Comes To Our State

CENTER FOR AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS: Socialism In Arizona: Chinese Funded Activism Comes To Our State

By the Center for American Institutions |

Behind the anti-ICE, pro-Hamas, anti-Iran war, and some No Kings protests in Arizona (and across the nation) rests the pro-Maoist Party of Socialism and Liberation. The Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) is a pro-Maoist communist party funded with millions of dollars by Shanghai-based American millionaire, Neville Roy Singham. Singham has close ties with the Chinese Communist Party. PSL lists on its website over a hundred chapters located in nearly every state of the union. 

PSL is ready at a moment’s notice to stage a protest as soon as a news story drops. These protests might be about ICE enforcement, the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack, abortion restrictions, or American action against the communist governments in Venezuela and Cuba.

To a dedicated core of protesters, the issue doesn’t matter so long as it can be spun as anti-capitalist and anti-Western.  While some protesters join because they are motivated by a specific issue, for the PSL, the revolutionary overthrow of American capitalism and political institutions is the ultimate goal.

The PSL runs candidates for office, but the party’s power rests in organizing street protests and disruptive demonstrations. Examples include:

  • In February, 2025, the Phoenix chapter of the PSL, led a series of anti-ICE protests across Maricopa County, including a march to the state house. PSL leaders, Lexia Isais, a public-school teacher, and her comrade, Jordan Napier organized the march on the state house. “No one is illegal! Viva Mexico!” Napier shouted. Organizers arranged similar marches in Flagstaff.  Isais got her start in PSL activism as an Arizona State University (ASU) student. PSL remains active today at ASU. In 2024, it led the construction of an encampment – the “ASU Liberated Zone” – on the Tempe campus in solidarity with Hamas.
  • Highway shutdowns are a specialty. In 2016, they organized the shutdown of a road to block access to a rally for then-candidate Donald Trump in Fountain Hills. Whether PSL was involved in a road closure and general chaos at an anti-illegal immigration enforcement rally in Glendale in 2025 is unclear from media reports, but it fits the pattern.
  • PSL cultivates college campus memberships. The University of Arizona also sported an encampment, while members of the PSL chapter chanted, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” at a rally denouncing Israeli actions in Lebanon, American capitalism, and Western imperialism everywhere.
  • PSL strongly continues to support the brutal Maduro regime in Venezuela. Protests against Maduro’s capture to stand trial in the United States drew few if any Venezuelans, who were thrilled to see the dictator removed from power. Protesters also rallied to the defense of the Iranian government at the start of the American Epic Fury campaign. In contrast Iranians turned up as counter-protesters.
  • PSL member Dania Duran was one of the organizers of the ICE Out protest at Phoenix Sky Harbor airport. At a time of public concern about long security lines because of the government shutdown, the stunt was an airport version of blocking traffic, since their presence could add to delays. The protest was sure to make the local mainstream news, even if travelers were annoyed. In this case and others, the PSL minimized its visibility to the public. The public-facing organizing group – the one more likely to generate quotes in mainstream press – was the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. It is funded through left-wing sources.  
  • Unlike the Democratic Socialists of America, the PSL does not believe that working within the Democratic Party is a viable strategy to gain power. PSL organized a march at a campaign appearance by Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. Kept outside of the venue, they shouted about how the ticket was insufficiently opposed to Israel.

The PSL does not publish membership totals, but mass membership is not its goal. PSL considers itself a vanguard party with a tight cadre of dedicated revolutionaries. 

The party follows the Leninist doctrine of a disciplined revolutionary party spelled out in his lengthy pamphlet “What Is to Be Done?” published in 1901. Lenin believed a centralized, disciplined party was necessary for communist revolution. As self-proclaimed vanguard party, PSL is organized as a centralist party in which all members are bound to defend and act on the party’s program. Members who don’t follow the party line are expelled.

Why PSL Matters

The PSL’s instant disruptive protests on most any leftist issue is obviously within their First Amendment rights, even if they dismiss the Constitution as a capitalist farce. 

Their funding and connections to Chinese Communist Party groups are what should alarm us. 

The PSL collects dues from members, but the real money comes through Neville Roy Singham, a tech billionaire who cashed out his business fortune to focus on his political passions. From his office in Shanghai, he funds left-wing, pro-Chinese groups in the United States as well as India, South America, Great Britain, and Africa.

Singham shares office space with a Chinese media group, with a link so seamless “It can be hard to tell where Maku begins and Mr. Singham’s groups end.”  It is a connection that goes back to at least 2019.

How much Singham contributes to the PSL is impossible to track. 

In a five-part series that documented the Singham network, Fox News estimated the spending of the total Singham network at $401 million between 2017 and 2025. 

Money that has been partially entangled with investment in Chinese companies and until recently passed through an untraceable Goldman Sacks donor-advised fund among other dodges that maximize opacity, makes it way to nonprofits with blandly positive names. 

The core group includes The People’s Forum, the Justice and Education Fund, the United Community Fund, The Progress Unity Fund, and BreakThrough Media (BT Media). Some exist only as post office boxes in UPS stores.

Media Matters

In media outreach, for example, Ben Becker, a founder of PSL, started BT Media in 2020. As the Network Contagion Research Institute reports, PSL dominates the key offices and editorial team of BT News. They include:

  1. Claudia De la Cruz – BT Media’s Secretary and Director, as well as PSL’s candidate for the 2024 Presidential election. 
  2. Karla Reyes – BT Media’s Chair and Director and De la Cruz’s 2024 PSL Presidential campaign running mate. 
  3. Yari Osorio – BT Media’s Treasurer and Director and PSL’s 2012 Vice-Presidential candidate.

“The degree of overlap between BT Media and PSL on their executive and editorial teams is so significant,” the NCRI concludes, “that one can easily conclude that the former is functionally serving as a mouthpiece for the latter.” BT Media is now a multimedia outlet for anti-Western content.

The People’s Dispatch published an approving story about No Kings rallies that even included an X post from the Speaker of Iran’s Parliament Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf. “Welcome to the party we started 47 years ago, No kings. This is the people of Iran, and we approve this message. #NoKings.” The People’s Dispatch weirdly characterized the 1979 Iranian Revolution as the fruit of class struggle.

Other Singham-funded media connections are much more subtle. The Justice and Education Fund, for example, has supported The Independent Media Institute. Through that grant, writers for such publications as Teen VogueSalon, and Food and Wine wind up in the Singham network. 

Demonstration Discord

Agitation and maximum public chaos is PSL’s core business, part of Singham’s “transnational protest and media machine.”  

With PSL as the networking hub, other groups, some basically hashtags for a temporary cause, demonstrators and pre-printed signs appear as if by magic.

PSL, with its siblings, the ANSWER Coalition, the People’s Forum, and Code Pink (Singham’s wife, Jodie Evans was a co-founder) reliably advance the views and interest of China. Code Pink was once critical of human rights abuses in China. Evans is now the co-author of China Is Not Our Enemy.

At a February 2026 Ways and Means committee hearing on foreign influence in America’s tax-exempt sector, Adam Sohn, Co-founder of Narravance, a social media research and intelligence firm, concluded:

“The ANSWER Coalition and the Party for Socialism and Liberation mobilize the protesters. The People’s Forum trains and coordinates the activists. BreakThrough News handles messaging and media amplification. The impact of this money is ongoing: federal property vandalized at Union Station; American flags burned and police officers assaulted. Airports blocked at JFK and LAX. Brooklyn and Manhattan bridges shut down. Ambulances and commuters disrupted. Wall Street blockaded; holiday commerce halted at Macy’s Herald Square; and immigration and law enforcement facilities targeted. This is not grassroots protest. It is a repeatable system for paralyzing American infrastructure on demand, financed through U.S. tax law, and aligned with a hostile foreign power. It is an active vulnerability we cannot afford to leave intact.

In multiple decisions, the United States Supreme Court upheld the right for free speech for communist and radical agitators. The Center for American Institutions supports this right for free speech. Citizens though have a right to know that Arizona popup protests are not spontaneous expressions of widespread public discontent. The Arizona mainstream media has an obligation to report the news truthfully.    

Originally published by The Center for American Institutions.

The Center for American Institutions examines issue confronting the state of Arizona. Its goal is to go behind the headlines to better inform the citizens of our state.

JULIA CARTWRIGHT: America Risks Losing The Advanced Nuclear Race To China

JULIA CARTWRIGHT: America Risks Losing The Advanced Nuclear Race To China

By Julia Cartwright |

The United States is facing an urgent strategic issue that is moving much faster than most of Washington’s current energy debates.

Right now, China is rapidly moving ahead in next-generation nuclear, specifically thorium-fueled molten salt reactors, building directly on technologies the United States originally pioneered at Oak Ridge. Their TMSR-LF1 molten salt reactor has already demonstrated key milestones in the thorium fuel cycle under real operating conditions. China has developed a pathway to abundant, high-density, domestically controlled energy capable of supporting industry, AI and data centers, maritime applications, and defense for decades.

At the same time, China is positioning itself as the future exporter of this technology and associated fuel services, which would give them enduring leverage over global nuclear deployment, standards, and supply chains. If they secure cheaper and more secure sovereign baseload power while we dismantle our own strategic advantages, no tariff regime or short-term subsidy program will offset that structural gap.

By contrast, the U.S. is allowing its position to erode. We are downblending our limited U-233 inventory, treating it as a cleanup problem instead of what it is: a uniquely valuable strategic asset for advanced fuel cycles and life-saving medical isotope production. This is exactly the quiet, procedural decision-making that risks foreclosing options while our competitors scale up.

Congress can still change course, but it must act now:

Immediately Pause U-233 Downblending
Place a hold on further downblending and require a comprehensive strategic review of remaining U-233, including its potential for thorium/molten salt reactors, medical isotopes, and national security.

Recognize U-233 and Thorium R&D as Strategic Assets
Direct DOE to treat these materials and programs as strategic infrastructure, not mere liabilities, with clear interagency coordination and regular reporting to Congress.

Launch a Serious Thorium / Molten Salt Demonstration Program
Provide dedicated, multi-year funding for U.S.-based demonstrations in partnership with private innovators, with milestones focused on deployed hardware and licensing, not just reports.

Modernize Advanced Reactor Licensing
Instruct NRC and DOE to create fit-for-purpose licensing pathways for non-light-water designs so U.S. companies can build and iterate here at home instead of ceding deployment experience to China.

Require Transparency & Briefings
Request immediate briefings on U-233 inventories, current and planned downblending, and DOE’s thorium/MSR activities so Congress can make informed decisions before irreversible steps are taken.

Beyond the federal urgency, there is a major upside here for forward-looking states.

A state that chooses to lead on thorium and molten salt reactor development through hosting secure U-233/thorium R&D infrastructure, aligning its regulatory environment, and partnering with private innovators can position itself as a long-term anchor for:

  • World-class industrial power costs: Stable, high-density baseload power can underwrite advanced manufacturing, refining, AI and data centers, and port and logistics facilities, drawing in the very projects now shopping globally for clean, reliable energy.
  • High-wage technical and research jobs: National labs, engineering programs, medical isotope production, and nuclear supply-chain firms cluster around serious demonstration efforts, creating durable, specialized employment rather than transient construction booms.
  • Cutting-edge medical and technology ecosystems: Leveraging U-233 for medical isotopes supports a globally relevant health sciences hub, while advanced nuclear capability underpins secure digital infrastructure for finance, AI, and defense applications.
  • Energy, economic, and strategic credibility: A state that proves this out, prudently and safely, will not only strengthen U.S. security, it will become a model other states and allies look to for standards, supply-chain partnerships, and deployment know-how.

Put simply, this is the kind of targeted leadership that can make a state’s energy and industrial base the benchmark others quietly measure against. 

One concrete path would be to build on the framework, as an example, of S.4242 – the Thorium Energy Security Act of 2022, which sought to preserve U-233 inventories to foster development of thorium molten-salt reactors and required DOE to secure and manage those inventories strategically. The government could:

  • Explore state-level resolutions or companion legislation urging preservation of U-233 and support for thorium/MSR R&D.
  • Signal interest in hosting secure storage, processing, and demonstration facilities consistent with an updated Thorium Energy Security framework.
  • Pair that with state incentives and regulatory clarity that welcome advanced nuclear innovators while maintaining rigorous safety and environmental standards.

China is not waiting. If we continue down this path, we are not simply “falling behind,” we are choosing to surrender long-term energy, technological, and geopolitical leverage, along with an opportunity for American states to anchor the next generation of strategic industry at home rather than abroad.

Julia Cartwright, PhD, is a Senior Research Fellow in Law and Economics at the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER).

STEVE MILLOY: Thankful For President Trump’s Climate Report Card

STEVE MILLOY: Thankful For President Trump’s Climate Report Card

By Steve Milloy |

President Trump has certainly shaken up, if not severely damaged, the climate hoax and Green New Scam in just 10 short months. Here’s a list of his 10 top climate-related accomplishments for which we should all be thankful this holiday season:

  1. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has proposed to end the government’s “scientific” basis for the climate hoax by rescinding the Obama EPA’s 2009 illegal and incorrect determination that emissions of greenhouse gases endanger the public welfare. As part of this effort, the Department of Energy issued a report by top climate scientists concluding that U.S. greenhouse gas emissions will have no detectable effect on global climate change.
  2. President Trump, again, pulled the U.S. out of the 2015 Paris Climate Accord, an unconstitutional effort by Presidents Obama and Biden to adopt a United Nations treaty without ratification by the Senate.
  3. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act terminated hundreds of billions of dollars of the climate-related “Green New Scam” spending of the (so-called) Inflation Reduction Act, including all subsidies for electric vehicle purchases.
  4. President Trump has directed his administration to reduce Green New Scam spending that survived the One Big Beautiful Bill by means of bureaucratic review, red tape and delay. The rent-seeking and piratical thieves who want to steal from taxpayers played hardball to save some of their ill-gotten gains. The President is now showing, rather impressively, that he can play hardball right back.
  5. President Trump signed into law a bill terminating California’s electric vehicle mandate. Greens had tried to mandate EVs in California to force carmakers to only make EVs for the entire nation. Thanks to the President, that will not happen in the foreseeable future.
  6. The EPA scored an appellate court victory in its effort to reclaim $20 billion in Biden EPA Green New Scam panic spending made infamous by the Project Veritas video, “We’re Throwing Gold Bars Off the Titanic.”
  7. President Trump halted a number of offshore wind projects and cut funding for many others. There are other projects that deserve to be terminated, such as the largest U.S. offshore wind farm being built by Virginia’s Dominion Energy, but a great start has been made so far.
  8. Stunningly, President Trump stopped cold a U.N. treaty to implement a global tax on shipping emissions by threatening would-be signatories with tariffs. This treaty would have been the first global climate tax.
  9. President Trump boycotted and sent no delegation to the United Nations climate conference (COP-30) in Brazil, rendering the annual meeting even more confused and meaningless than it usually is.
  10. President Trump delivered a blistering speech to the United Nations blasting the climate hoax for about 15 minutes or so. The President summed up his views on climate in this one memorable sentence: “The carbon footprint is a hoax, made up by people with evil intentions and they’re heading down a path of total destruction.”

That’s quite a list. But much is left to be done. Some of the big items are as follows:

  • The EPA must finalize its rescission of the endangerment finding and then successfully defend the rescission in the Supreme Court.
  • All the Green New Scam spending must be terminated as soon as possible. Every dollar spent is a dollar stolen from taxpayers and invested in making us more energy dependent on Communist China.
  • It is not enough to withdraw only from the Paris Climate Accord. President Trump must withdraw the United States from the 1992 parent treaty, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
  • And it would be really awesome if President Trump also withdrew the U.S. from the 1987 Montreal Protocol, the bogus treaty allegedly addressing the imaginary “ozone hole.” That treaty, the follow-on Kigali Amendment ratified during the Biden administration, and language in the American Innovation and Manufacturing Act of 2020 signed by President Trump, has only been used to make refrigeration and air conditioning pointlessly more expensive.

I heard Al Gore tell a group of conservatives in January 2006 that the real purpose of the Montreal Protocol was to demonstrate that a global environmental treaty could be implemented. That “success” was then subsequently used as precedent for the UNFCCC and its spinoff climate treaties, the Kyoto Protocol and Paris Climate Accord. The ozone hole hoax paved the way for the climate hoax and Green New Scam. It’s all been a multi-trillion-dollar fraud on American consumers and taxpayers.

America became great before these pointless environmental treaties. It has been greatly harmed and dangerously hamstrung by them since their ratification. If MAGA means anything, it means exiting international efforts to cripple the U.S. with junk science-based environmental treaties. And it would make a great Christmas present to the nation. Just a suggestion.

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Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Steve Milloy is a contributor to The Daily Caller News Foundation, a biostatistician, and lawyer. He posts on X at @JunkScience.

VIJAY JAYARAJ: New Study Sheds Light On How Many Have Suffered Due To Foolish Green Policies

VIJAY JAYARAJ: New Study Sheds Light On How Many Have Suffered Due To Foolish Green Policies

By Vijay Jayaraj |

A new report from McKinsey & Company, the “Global Energy Perspective,” lays bare what many of us – dismissed as “climate deniers” – have been asserting all along: Coal, oil and natural gas will continue to be the dominant sources of global energy well past 2050.

The McKinsey outlook for 2025 sharply adjusts prior projections. Last year, the management consultant’s models had coal demand falling 40% by 2035. Today, McKinsey projects an uptick of 1% over the same period. The dramatic reversal is driven by record commissioning of coal-fired power plants in China, unexpected increases in global electricity use, and the lack of viable alternatives for industries like steel, chemicals and heavy manufacturing.

The report states that the three fossil fuels will still supply up to 55% of global energy in 2050, a forecast that looks low to me. Today’s share for hydrocarbons is more than 60% for electricity generation and more than 80% for primary energy consumption.

In any case, McKinsey’s report confirms what seasoned energy analysts and pragmatic policymakers have long maintained: The energy transition will not be swift, simple, or governed solely by climate targets. In fact, this energy transition will not happen at all without large scale deployment of nuclear, geothermal or other technological innovations that prove practical.

In places such as India, Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, the top energy priorities are access, affordability and reliability, which together add up to national security. Planners are acutely aware of a trap: Sole reliance on weather-dependent power risks blackouts, industrial disruption, economic decline and civil unrest.

That is why many developing nations are embracing a dual track: continued investment in conventional generation (coal, gas, nuclear) while developing alternative technologies. McKinsey says this in consultancy lingo: “Countries and regions will follow distinct trajectories based on local economic conditions, resource endowment, and the realities facing particular industries.”

In countries like India, Indonesia and Nigeria, the scale of electrification and industrial expansion is enormous. These countries cannot afford to wait decades for perfect solutions. They need “reliable and good enough for now.” That means conventional fuels will be retained.

McKinsey’s analysis also underscores what physics and engineering dictate: Intermittent and weather-dependent sources, such as wind and solar, require vast land areas, backup batteries and generation and power-grid investments, none of which come cheaply nor quickly.

The technologies of wind and solar branded as renewable should instead be called economy killers. They make for expensive and unstable electrical systems that have brought energy-rich nations like Germany to their knees. After spending billions of dollars on unreliable wind turbines and solar panels and demolishing nuclear plants and coal plants, the country is struggling with high prices and economic stagnation.

The Germans now have a word for their self-inflicted crisis: Dunkelflaute. It means “dark doldrums”—a period of cold, sunless, windless days when their “green” grid fails. During a Dunkelflaute in November 2024, fossil fuels were called on to provide 70% of Germany’s electricity.

If “renewables” were truly capable, planners would shut down fossil fuel generation. But that is not the case. While wind and solar are pursued in some places, coal and natural gas remain much sought-after fuels. In the first half of 2025 alone, China commissioned about 21 gigawatts (GW) of new coal-fired capacity, which is more than any other country and the largest increase since 2016.

Further, China has approved construction of 25 GW of new coal plants in the first half of 2025. As of July, China’s mainland has nearly 1,200 coal plants, far outstripping the rest of the world.

McKinsey points to a dramatic surge in electricity demand driven by data centers, which is estimated to be about 17 % annually from 2022 to 2030 in the 38 OECD countries.  This kind of growth in electricity use simply cannot be met by wind and solar.

When analysts, journalists and engineers point out these realities, they’re branded as “shills” for the fossil fuel industry. However, it is not public relations to point out the physics and economics that make up the math for meeting the world’s energy needs. Dismissing such facts is to deny that reliable energy remains the bedrock of modern civilization.

The cost of foolish “green” policies is being paid in lost jobs, ruined businesses, disrupted lives and impoverishment that could have been avoided by wiser choices.

For those who have repeated energy realities for years, the vindication is bittersweet. The satisfaction of being right is tempered by the knowledge that many have suffered because reality has been ignored.

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Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Vijay Jayaraj is a contributor to The Daily Caller News Foundation and Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Va. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India.