Politics
China-Linked Group’s Socialist ‘Liberation Centers’ Coming To A Town Near You
[Wikimedia Commons/Public/Donghae Fang]
A socialist group with ties to a China-based financier is setting up indoor hubs for radical activism in neighborhoods across the U.S.
The Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) has at least 28 event spaces, often called “Liberation Centers,” open since 2021 or in preparation, a Daily Caller News Foundation review of online PSL posts and local news reports found. The organization uses the centers to cultivate “revolutionary” thought and attract new local followers while organizing protests against foreign policy decisions and law enforcement.
Former tech mogul Neville Singham, based in Shanghai, has donated tens of millions of dollars to a network of leftist groups that share several top officials with the PSL, the DCNF and The New York Times reported. Like Singham, the PSL aligns itself with pro-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) narratives. The group’s websites praise late Chinese communist dictator Mao Zedong for how he “liberated” China with the CCP’s bloody revolution and deny the government’s infamous massacre of pro-democracy protesters in 1989.
The PSL did not respond to the DCNF’s requests for comment.
PSL activists frame their activity in the U.S. around building a “movement against racism, poverty and war,” according to the Atlanta Liberation Center’s website. They have gotten so adept that neighborhoods wary of socialist political agendas should take note, Manhattan Institute investigative analyst Stu Smith told the DCNF.
“Their model is simple; find a local grievance, radicalize it, and turn it into movement infrastructure,” said Smith, who researches left-wing activist networks for the conservative think tank. “These centers are often staffed by semi-local organizers who cut their teeth elsewhere, then parachute into new communities.”
“They reach out to teenagers, encourage school disruptions and walkouts, and help create mini-PSL pipelines disguised as harmless ‘student unions,'” Smith told the DCNF.
A February Instagram post from the PSL’s Columbus, Ohio, chapter offers an example, calling on students and parents to help arrange “walk outs” against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). “Join the PSL at the Columbus Liberation Center this Sunday for a student & parent organizing meeting to build connection between highschool organizers, discuss strategies for building the movement, and plan together on our next steps!” the post reads.
Other PSL social media posts invite supporters into rooms with literature on “Trans Liberation,” signs honoring late Cuban revolutionary and mass murderer Che Guevara or a “Prison Abolition — Marxist Perspective” workshop.
“If you want a foreign-maligned influence operation in your backyard, targeting your community and your children, then ignore the Liberation Centers,” Smith said.
‘We Must Be Organized!’
In addition to Liberation Centers already open, the PSL scheduled grand openings in June for locations in Houston, Texas, and Washington, D.C., the group’s online posts show. The group has also fundraised for a Louisville, Kentucky, Liberation Center since at least 2024.
The PSL chapter in the nation’s capital demands a 90% budget cut for the Metropolitan Police Department, cashless bail, “access to gender affirming care” for “trans youth,” “Guaranteed Income” and other far-left agenda items, according to the upcoming D.C. Liberation Center’s website.
Two of the 28 spaces the DCNF identified are a PSL-affiliated cafe in Durham, North Carolina, and the group’s “Lancaster People’s Center” in Pennsylvania, which serve the same event-hosting function as the so-called Liberation Centers, according to PSL posts.
PSL centers have popped up in conservative and liberal areas alike, from Portland, Oregon, to the West Virginia panhandle. Pennsylvania appears to have the most of any state with seven in Lancaster, Pittsburgh, Reading, Phoenixville, Philadelphia, York and the West Chester borough of Chester County.
The PSL is not required to publicly disclose its funding, and several of its Liberation Centers claim to rely on PSL volunteer staff and crowdfunding. The PSL’s Albuquerque Liberation Center, in turn, calls itself “the fiscal sponsor of activists building working-class power in” the area.
“It is not just one group or one campaign,” Smith said of the PSL and other Singham-backed groups. “It is an ecosystem of overlapping organizations, causes, and front-facing projects that all reinforce each other locally.”
Singham led an Illinois-based tech firm that he sold for $785 million in 2017 and poured money into a web of advocacy groups, The New York Times reported. The paper and The Daily Beast documented several examples of Singham or the activists he supports attending CCP propaganda events alongside Chinese officials. Singham also previously advised the China-funded tech firm Huawei, The Daily Beast reported.
Smith told the DCNF his own town has a nearby PSL center, declining to reveal his location.
“I don’t live in some massive activist hub, either,” Smith said. “My guess is we ended up with one because the local radicals got especially rowdy during the [2020 Black Lives Matter] ‘Summer of Love,’ and PSL saw an opportunity to plant a flag.”
In a Wednesday Instagram post, the PSL invited potential allies to channel their rage against “capitalism, racism, war” into sophisticated politics by joining the organization.
“It’s not enough to be angry – we must be organized!” the group’s national chapter declared.
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