The mayor of a Southern California city has resigned and agreed to enter a guilty plea to a federal charge of acting as an unregistered agent of the Chinese government, authorities announced Monday.
Eileen Wang, who served as mayor of Arcadia — a city of roughly 53,000 residents located about 13 miles northeast of Los Angeles — is expected to appear before a federal court in downtown Los Angeles Monday afternoon. The formal plea is scheduled for the coming weeks.
Wang, 58, was first charged in April with a single felony count of operating in the United States as an agent of a foreign government without notifying U.S. authorities, as required by law. Federal prosecutors say she and an associate, Yaoning “Mike” Sun, worked from late 2020 to 2022 on behalf of officials from the People’s Republic of China to advance pro-Beijing interests on American soil. The two ran a Chinese American-focused website called U.S. News Center, which they used to publish content at the direction of PRC government officials.
Sun, who was also listed as the treasurer of Wang’s 2022 election campaign, pleaded guilty to the same charge last October and is currently serving a four-year prison sentence.
Court documents show that in one instance in June 2021, a Chinese government official sent Wang a link to a letter published in the Los Angeles Times, authored by the PRC consul general in Los Angeles. The letter denied reports of genocide, forced labor, and abuse of Uyghurs in Xinjiang. Wang shared it on her website within minutes. The United States and several other countries have formally declared that Beijing’s treatment of the Uyghur population constitutes genocide and crimes against humanity.
The felony carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in federal prison.
Wang’s attorneys, Jason Liang and Brian Sun, said their client accepts responsibility for what happened. “She apologizes and is sorry for the mistakes she has made in her personal life,” they said in a statement. “Her love and devotion for the Arcadia community have not changed and did not waver.” Their statement also alluded to Wang’s prior relationship with Sun — the two were engaged at the time of the alleged conduct — adding that she had misplaced her “trust and love for apparently the wrong person who ultimately led her astray.” Wang has said that relationship ended in spring 2024.
Arcadia’s city manager, Dominic Lazzaretto, said the investigation is limited to Wang’s individual conduct and does not implicate city funds or personnel. “The charges are for conduct that ceased after Ms. Wang was sworn into office in December 2022,” he said.
Wang had been elected to Arcadia’s five-member city council in November 2022, with the mayoral post rotating among council members. She has since resigned.
Prosecutors have also noted her communications with John Chen, another individual who pleaded guilty to acting as a Chinese government agent and received a 20-month prison sentence.
