by Ethan Faverino | May 24, 2026 | News
By Ethan Faverino |
As Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs adopts a firmer rhetorical stance toward the People’s Republic of China, The Center Square states national security experts are closely monitoring whether she will sign a package of bipartisan bills designed to protect the state’s critical infrastructure, land, universities, procurement processes, and consumers from foreign adversary influence.
In previous years, Governor Hobbs vetoed several China-related measures, citing concerns over economic growth, investment portfolios, and impacts on the healthcare system. However, she now has the opportunity to act on up to seven new bills addressing these national security priorities.
In the past three years (2024-2026), Hobbs vetoed measures including:
- HB 2504 and HB 2584: Genetic sequencing restrictions involving foreign adversary technology
- SB 1340: Prohibiting state investments in foreign adversaries
- HB 2542: Banning state contracts with companies domiciled in China for goods or services
- SB 1109: Restrictions on foreign adversary land purchases near military bases and critical infrastructure
Her veto messages previously emphasized potential economic harm and described one bill as “weak and spineless.” This year, despite vetoing another genetic sequencing bill over healthcare system concerns, her office has signaled a tougher approach toward China.
The current package includes targeted protections:
- Arizona Critical Infrastructure Protection Act (HB 2134): Prohibits Chinese companies from providing software for critical infrastructure and bars contracts granting them access. It requires annual certifications, establishes a prohibited equipment list (including Wi-Fi routers, modems, school bus cameras, smart meters, solar inverters, and IoT modules), and creates a score communications channel for emergencies. Exceptions exist for cases with no reasonable alternatives and pre-approval.
- Land Protection Bill (SB 1683): Bars foreign adversary nations and agents from purchasing, leasing, or acquiring substantial interests (+15%) in Arizona real property. It prohibits installing surveillance or communications equipment and includes strong enforcement mechanisms, including divestiture, forfeiture, and reporting to federal authorities. Limited exceptions apply for inheritance or debt collection with prompt divestiture.
- Higher Education Protections (SB 1327): Requires the Arizona Board of Regents to review and approve gifts, contracts, or partnerships with foreign adversary nations. Universities must adopt comprehensive research security policies and annually report significant foreign funding.
- Procurement Safeguards (SB 2170): Prevents companies domiciled in and controlled by the Chinese government, military, or ruling party from bidding on state electronic and information technology contracts. Requires certification letters, with severe penalties for false statements.
- Lobbyist Registration (SB 1100): Mandates foreign adversary principals to register lobbyists, disclose activities, and pay fees. Creates a public database and penalties for nondisclosures.
- Consumer Fraud Enforcement (SB 1308): Establishes a Foreign Adversary Fraud Office in the Attorney General’s office to pursue violations involving foreign adversary technology. Creates dedicated funds for enforcement and technology replacement in critical infrastructure.
Josh Hodges, former senior director at the National Security Council under President Trump, current member of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, and national security advisor to House Speaker Mike Johnson, described these bills as “massively impactful.”
Hodges told The Center Square, “It is important these bills are passed collectively to ‘really address the full scope’ of the Chinese threat.” He noted that Hobbs has vetoed almost every piece of legislation related to China for “specious reason” often based on claims that bills were too vague or broad, despite federal agencies identifying ongoing subnational Chinese Communist Party efforts to embed operations in key U.S. assets.
He expressed hope that Hobbs’ recent shift in rhetoric will translate into action: “Arizonans will find out quickly whether their interests are being chosen over politics.” According to Hodges, vetoing these measures without strong justification could indicate undue influence or undisclosed lobbying.
These bills represent a significant opportunity for Arizona to align with growing nationwide efforts to protect critical assets from foreign adversary risks while maintaining necessary flexibility for public safety and economic needs.
Ethan Faverino is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
by Center for American Institutions | May 5, 2026 | Opinion
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:
- Claudia De la Cruz – BT Media’s Secretary and Director, as well as PSL’s candidate for the 2024 Presidential election.
- Karla Reyes – BT Media’s Chair and Director and De la Cruz’s 2024 PSL Presidential campaign running mate.
- 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 Vogue, Salon, 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.
by Staff Reporter | Oct 29, 2025 | Education, News
By Staff Reporter |
Northern Arizona University (NAU) is the latest in the state to drop its program with a Chinese university over national security concerns.
House committees on the Chinese Community Party and Education and the Workforce released a report last month flagging security concerns within NAU’s partnership with a Chinese municipal public university, Chongqing University of Post and Telecommunications (CQUPT).
The report outlined the main pathways by which China manipulates the American university system to benefit its military interests.
“What once came through Confucius Institutes now flows through new channels — less visible but no less strategic,” stated the report. “The Select Committee is now actively investigating these additional CCP activities — including the China Scholarship Counsel and student visa pathways — which, combined with joint institutes, illustrate a coordinated strategy by the CCP: leverage American institutions to train PRC talent, absorb U.S. research, and convert that knowledge into military and economic advantage. Joint institutes are just one vector — the problem is systemic.”
Rep. Eli Crane commended NAU for shutting down the program following the report’s publication.
“I applaud Northern Arizona University’s leadership in reviewing its international partnerships and ensuring that its programs align with national security initiatives,” said Crane in a press release on Monday. “NAU’s actions reflect a responsible approach to protecting students, faculty, and the integrity of U.S. research and education. We greatly appreciate their commitment to these shared values, as well as all they do for Northern Arizona.”
The CQUPT program was a 3+1 dual-degree program in Electrical Engineering.
Full withdrawal will occur within 90 days, per Crane’s press release.
NAU’s program was one of over 50 university partnerships the congressional committees deemed “high-risk” for their involvement with universities guided by Chinese Communist Party (CCP) military and defense interests. The congressional committees disclose that the list is not all-inclusive and that more may exist.
The University of Arizona (U of A) had two programs included in the congressional report that were deemed high risk: one with the Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT) and the other with the Arizona College of Technology (ACT) at Hebei University of Technology (HUT).
The HIT program is one of three joint programs that American universities launched with one of China’s Seven Sons of National Defense (SSND) universities.
Only universities selected by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to advance China’s military and defense research qualify as SSND.
Although the report declared the HIT partnership to be active, U of A has stated it terminated its partnership in December 2023.
The committees also determined the University of Arizona’s Arizona College of Technology at Hebei University of Technology.
Last month, U of A faculty were advised that Chinese microcampuses would be closed following congressional advice on national security concerns with the partnerships.
U of A issued a notice on its Research and Partnerships page last December that SSND posed “atypical security risks and concerns about misuse of research for military purposes” due to their being controlled by CCP’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Matthew Holloway | Oct 5, 2025 | News
By Matthew Holloway |
An investigative report released last week revealed that Arizona’s Democrat Governor Katie Hobbs accepted a campaign donation from Pin Ni, a Chinese Communist Party member and board director at major automotive parts maker Wanxiang Group.
According to the report, the donation appears to have been made after Hobbs vetoed one piece of legislation that would have pushed Chinese influence out of Arizona’s prominent healthcare and research base and another piece of legilslation that would have banned the Chinese Government from owning land in the state.
Michael Lucci, founder of State Armor, a national security group, told the Washington Examiner in a statement Tuesday, “State Armor respectfully calls upon Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs to partner with the Arizona legislature to oppose America’s adversaries instead of opposing the legislature’s attempts to protect Arizona from Communist China.”
He added, “In the last two years, Governor Hobbs has vetoed more legislation to protect her state from the CCP than any other governor in the country, including common-sense legislation to protect Arizona land and Arizonan genetic information from China’s military. So it is disappointing but not shocking to see Gov. Hobbs takes political money from CCP-tied billionaires.”
As previously reported by AZ Free News, Hobbs has already fallen under heavy criticism from Republican lawmakers following her veto of HB 2542, which would have blocked corporations with ties to the People’s Republic of China from securing contracts with the State of Arizona. She also vetoed SB 1109, a bill that would have specifically targeted Chinese purchases of land in Arizona, but approved Senate Bill 1082, which applied restrictions on land purchases to China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea.
Lucci urged Hobbs to return the funds and enact further legislation to protect Arizona from Beijing’s influence writing, “No amount of political contributions is worth selling out the great state of Arizona to the CCP. Governor Hobbs should send the CCP-tied money back to its source and instead enact a range of executive orders and legislative solutions to protect our state from America’s enemies.”
The timing of the allegations against Hobbs, coupled with the entry of a third Republican, Congressman David Schweikert, into the 2026 gubernatorial race could prove a serious challenge for the already embattled Democrat.
Recent polling shows Congressman Andy Biggs as the clear frontrunner in the Arizona Republican gubernatorial primary over Schweikert and businesswoman Karrin Taylor Robson.
Matthew Holloway is a senior reporter for AZ Free News. Follow him on X for his latest stories, or email tips to Matthew@azfreenews.com.
by Matthew Holloway | Sep 8, 2025 | News
By Matthew Holloway |
An Arizona congressman is warning constituents about the Chinese Communist Party’s close ties with Mexican drug cartels.
Congressman Abe Hamadeh, who sits on the House Armed Services Committee, shared an article on X about the U.S. Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) discovery of Chinese networks laundering billions of dollars for Mexican drug cartels through American financial institutions.
In his post, Hamadeh explained, “The Treasury’s FinCEN discovered that Chinese networks have been using our country to launder billions of dollars for the Mexican cartels. This is only part of a continued & concerted effort from a hostile CCP regime to undermine America’s public safety.”
According to The Center Square, in a report from FinCEN, the Treasury Department analyzed 137,153 Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) reports totaling approximately $312 billion in suspicious activity from 2020 to 2024 that “sheds light on how [Chinese money laundering networks (CMLN),] launder illicit proceeds from criminal activities, including drug trafficking, and how CMLNs launder money on a global scale.”
The report revealed several alarming findings regarding CMLNs, describing a complex web of dirty money connecting ubiquitous real estate transactions throughout the United States to human trafficking over the Mexican border, and even assisted living facilities in New York.
“Ultimately, Chinese citizens’ demand for large quantities of U.S. dollars and the cartels’ need to launder their illicit U.S. dollar proceeds has resulted in a mutualistic relationship wherein the cartels sell off their illicitly obtained U.S. dollars to CMLNs who, in turn, sell the U.S. dollars to Chinese citizens seeking to evade China’s currency control laws,” the report explained.
According to the report, “The PRC maintains strict currency controls, also known as capital flight restrictions, which limit the amount of money Chinese citizens can transfer abroad each year to 50,000 USD for investment and financial purposes.”
To bypass these restrictions, many Chinese nationals turn to this underground banking system or ‘CUBS.’ Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence John Hurley told The Center Square, “Money laundering networks linked to individual passport holders from the People’s Republic of China enable cartels to poison Americans with fentanyl, conduct human trafficking, and wreak havoc among communities across our great nation.”
The report found, “Many Chinese citizens have turned to alternative methods, like the Chinese underground banking system (CUBS), to bypass these restrictions. The CUBS consists of various individuals and businesses from different industries who collaborate through ‘mirror transfers’ to move money across borders, as part of informal value transfer system schemes. The CUBS, in turn, depend on CMLNs to secure foreign currency.”
FinCEN summarized that in just the past five years, it has recorded a significant increase in the money laundering schemes at play between CMLNs and Mexican Drug Cartels, with the agents “gain(ing) prominence among global money laundering groups due to their reliability, low fees, organizational structure, worldwide presence, and access to the U.S. financial system.” It also shared that that this massive financial windfall for bad actors in China are directly to tied to operations that “launder illicit proceeds from otherwise unrelated criminal networks involved in a range of illicit activities, including fraud schemes; human trafficking and smuggling; marijuana grow house operations; and tax evasion, by facilitating the exchange of cash proceeds.”
Matthew Holloway is a senior reporter for AZ Free News. Follow him on X for his latest stories, or email tips to Matthew@azfreenews.com.
