Alleged Chinese influence on US politics

The US government is planning a major new Mandarin-language initiative in an effort to bolster its global reputation at a time of Chinese ascendancy and eroding American soft power. Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Asia (RFA) are joining forces on a new network called Global Mandarin, according to internal memos, job placement advertisements and interviews with people close to Washington’s information arms. Its annual budget would be between $5 million and $10 million, potentially rising in the second year, according to a source who requested anonymity given links to the networks. It would focus on softer content aimed at reaching younger Chinese in the US, China and beyond. The US roll

Someday, perhaps soon, Xi Jinping and Donald Trump will sign an agreement resolving the US-China trade war. But the trade dispute has exposed more fundamental cleavages between China and the community of democratic nations. The most important clashes between China and the West concern not soybean exports nor the protection of patents, but free expression and open inquiry. Nowhere are those clashes taking place more vigorously than on university campuses. Consider the case of Nathan Law, the Hong Kong student who became a leader in the city’s 2014 “umbrella movement.”  Law was jailed for his activism and barred from legislative politics, but was accepted into a graduate program at Yale Unive