The New York firm has been going through faux bomb threats and disinformation amid world excursions to deliver again conventional Chinese language tradition predating communism.
The Chinese language regime’s rising marketing campaign to suppress a New York-based performing arts agency is tantamount to unrestricted warfare, in accordance with Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.).
“They battle on each single inch of the battlefield,” Perry informed The Epoch Occasions, referring to the Chinese language Communist Get together.
Unrestricted warfare is a doctrine that leverages all out there nonmilitary means to subdue an enemy. Beneath such techniques, China is making the most of the U.S. judicial system and the liberty of the media, Perry added.
Shen Yun showcases dance and music performances below the tagline “China earlier than communism.” The corporate was based in 2006 by practitioners of Falun Gong—a religion group brutally persecuted by the Chinese language regime since 1999—and has been a goal of the CCP since.
Perry, who sits on the Home overseas affairs and intelligence committees, mentioned it was necessary to take these threats critically.
It’s necessary for the US and the West basically to “perceive the pathology of this enemy,” he mentioned. “The CCP simply takes benefit of the U.S. judiciary system and likewise the liberty of the media.”
For the intimidation emails, the senders use Digital Personal Community, or VPN, making it laborious to hint the place the emails are from, “however we’re properly aware of the threats and the coercion and the intimidation by the Communist Chinese language Get together,” mentioned Perry.
Shen Yun emcee Leeshai Lemish speaks at a press convention highlighting the Chinese language Communist Get together’s transnational repression actions concentrating on the corporate on the Lincoln Heart in New York Metropolis on March 26, 2025. Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Occasions
‘Terrorism’
Shen Yun performances typically embody tales about human rights abuses that Falun Gong practitioners undergo in China for adhering to their religion, which some performers and their members of the family have skilled.
Indiana state Rep. Craig Haggard, who in April proposed a decision to acknowledge Shen Yun’s artistry and values, recalled how watching Shen Yun led him to find out about pressured organ harvesting, which the Chinese language regime systematically carries out in China concentrating on prisoners of conscience, comparable to Falun Gong practitioners. As a father, it strikes him to know that peculiar households in China can be focused as state enemies, and the authorities may “simply have management over your loved ones’s life and loss of life.”
Shen Yun, he mentioned, is attempting to showcase “the attractive a part of China” whereas highlighting the darkness below communist rule.
Haggard known as the bomb threats in opposition to Shen Yun “outrageous” and a type of “terrorism.”
“They’re attempting to intimidate by means of threatened potential violence, and this is occurring in our personal yard,” Haggard informed The Epoch Occasions. He added that the Shen Yun artists, whereas comparatively secure inside U.S. borders, are “nonetheless taking an enormous danger by instantly difficult” the regime on its human rights abuses.
The Home Armed Companies Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairwoman Vicky Hartzler (R-Mo.) delivers remarks throughout a listening to within the Rayburn Home Workplace Constructing on Capitol Hill on Feb. 12, 2015. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Pictures
Preserving the ‘Stress up’
Vicky Hartzler, a commissioner of the U.S. Fee on Worldwide Spiritual Freedom and former congresswoman from Missouri, mentioned the bomb threats additionally reveal worry from the Chinese language authorities.
“It simply exhibits the extent of risk that they see from this group, and for a way profitable these occasions are in fostering constructive relationships between different international locations and the Chinese language individuals, and definitely practitioners of Falun Gong,” Hartzler informed The Epoch Occasions.
“The Chinese language Communist Get together sees this as a risk, they usually’re escalating the diploma of persecution” and “attempting to silence this constructive voice.”
The Chinese language regime has exploited free speech in the US to conduct focused disinformation campaigns, she mentioned, however “the place Chinese language authorities could also be placing out disinformation, there’s actually a chance to set the report straight by placing out the right data.”
She finds it a reminder to coach common Individuals on the techniques the regime makes use of.
“We have to be vigilant, but additionally we have to be assertive and shut them down once we can,” she mentioned. “So we’re not so weak to be taken in by them.”
Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), co-chair of the Congressional-Government Fee on China, listens throughout a press convention on the Cease Compelled Organ Harvesting Act handed by the Home on Capitol Hill on Could 7, 2025. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Occasions
Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), a member of the Home International Affairs Committee and co-chair of the Congressional-Government Fee on China, voiced an identical sentiment.
The US must “push again even more durable,” he mentioned.
Communist China is the “worst repressive state on the face of the earth,” he informed The Epoch Occasions. “So we’ve received to face as much as those that are getting harm, tortured once they get arrested.”
He mentioned the U.S. authorities “will deliver extra concentrate on transnational repression” from China and that he hopes President Donald Trump, when he meets with the Chinese language regime chief Xi Jinping, will urge the discharge of incarcerated Individuals and folks imprisoned for his or her religion.
“We’re going to maintain the stress up.”