Arcadia Mayor Eileen Wang has resigned following federal charges that she acted as an illegal agent of a foreign government, officials said Monday.
Wang was also the District 3 City Council member.
City Manager Dominic Lazzaretto released the following statement:
“We understand this news raises serious concerns, and we want to be direct with our community about what we know and where we stand.
“The allegations at the center of this case, that a foreign government sought to exert influence over a local elected official, are deeply troubling. We take them seriously.
“We want to be clear: this investigation concerns individual conduct, and the charges are for conduct that ceased after Ms. Wang was sworn into office in December 2022,” the city manager said.
An internal review by Arcadia officials confirmed that no city finances, staff or decision-making were connected with Wang’s work on behalf of the Chinese government, according to Lazzaretto.
He added that “all City Council actions are taken by the body as a whole and no single member holds unilateral authority. We have found no actions that require reconsideration or that are invalidated as a result of these developments. The remainder of the City Council is not under investigation, and city operations continue without interruption.”
Arcadia officials “remain committed to serving our residents with transparency, consistency, and the highest standard of public trust,” Lazzaretto said. “The city is ready to assist federal authorities if called upon to do so.”
Following the unsealing of her admission that she was a covert propagandist working for a consul general and other officials of the People’s Republic of China, Wang’s attorneys issued a statement on her behalf:
“One of the true highlights of Ms. Wang’s life has been the opportunity to serve the residents of Arcadia. She ran for the Arcadia City Council in 2022 because she genuinely loves this city and is devoted to the people and the community within it. None of that has changed. However, events in Ms. Wang’s personal life — including her trust and love for apparently the wrong person who ultimately led her astray — require her to step away from public service.”
Attorneys Jason Liang and Brian Sun said the ex-councilwoman and mayor recognizes the seriousness of the federal case against her “and has agreed to accept responsibility for her past personal mistakes. … It is important to note, however, that the conduct underlying the information and the agreement with the government relates solely to Ms. Wang’s personal life — i.e., a media platform that she once operated with someone whom she believed to be her fiance — and not to her conduct as an elected public official. …
“She apologizes and is sorry for the mistakes she has made in her personal life. Her love and devotion for the Arcadia community have not changed and did not waver. She asks for the community’s understanding and continued support. While this decision comes at great personal cost to Ms. Wang, she believes it is in the best interests of her supporters, her constituents and the city,” the statement concluded. “She will continue to find other ways to fulfill her longstanding commitment to serve Arcadia and the public.”
The council will select a mayor and mayor pro tem from among the remaining four members and will begin discussing how District 3 will be represented until the next election cycle this November, officials said.
Wang, 58, has agreed to plead guilty to one felony count, which comes with a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison, according to an April 1 plea agreement filed in LA federal court.
She was expected to make her initial appearance Monday afternoon in U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles and is expected to enter the guilty plea in the coming weeks.
“Individuals in our country who covertly do the bidding of foreign governments undermine our democracy,” First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said in a statement. “This plea agreement is the latest success in our determination to defend the homeland against China’s efforts to corrupt our institutions.”
Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg said in a statement, “Individuals elected to public office in the United States should act only for the people of the United States that they represent. It is deeply concerning that someone who previously received and executed directives from PRC officials is now in a position of public trust at all, but particularly so because that relationship with that foreign government had never been disclosed.”
According to the FBI’s investigation, Wang admitted that she secretly served the interests of the Chinese government.
“Let this serve as a clear warning: Individuals who act on behalf of foreign governments to influence our democracy will be identified, investigated and brought to justice,” Assistant Director Roman Rozhavsky of the FBI Counterintelligence and Espionage Division said in a statement. “Protecting the rule of law and the transparency of our democratic process remains at the core of the FBI’s mission, and we will continue working alongside our partners to safeguard the integrity of our elections and keep hostile actors from undermining the voices of the American people.”
Patrick Grandy, assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office, added, “All Americans should be alarmed to learn an elected official was brazenly spreading propaganda on behalf of the Chinese government. The FBI is dedicated to rooting out those illegally acting as agents of a foreign government as they do the bidding of America’s adversaries.”
According to the plea agreement, from late 2020 through 2022, Wang and Yaoning “Mike” Sun, 65, of Chino Hills, worked at the direction and control of PRC government officials and coordinated with U.S.-based individuals to promote the PRC’s interests by, among other things, promoting pro-PRC propaganda in the U.S.
Sun is serving a four-year federal prison sentence after he pleaded guilty in October to acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government. Sun was arrested in December 2024, two years after he was the treasurer of Wang’s City Council campaign.
Wang and Sun worked together to operate U.S. News Center, a website that purported to be a news source for the local Chinese American community, prosecutors reported. The pair received and executed instructions from China officials to post pro-PRC content on the website.
In June 2021, a PRC official provided Wang and other individuals via the WeChat encrypted messaging application with prewritten news articles, including an essay responding to the Los Angeles Times’ explanation of “China’s Stance on the Xinjiang Issue — There is no genocide in Xinjiang; there is no such thing as ‘forced labor’ in any production activity, including cotton production. Spreading such rumor to do defame China, destroy Xinjiang’s safety and stability, weaken local economy, suppress China’s development,” according to the plea agreement.
Minutes later, Wang posted the article on her website and responded to the PRC official with a link to it. The others in the group chat did the same, prompting the official to respond, “So fast, thank you everyone.”
In August 2021, Wang and three other members of the group chat shared the same article on their respective websites, after which the official thanked them for their work, according to prosecutors. At the Chinese government official’s request, Wang edited the story and sent the official a hyperlink reflecting the requested change, then sent a screenshot showing the story had been viewed 15,128 times.
The official responded, “Great!,” and Wang replied, “Thank you leader.”
In November 2021, Wang communicated with John Chen, who prosecutors described as a high-level member of the PRC intelligence apparatus, according to court documents. Chen regularly attended elite Chinese Communist Party functions, including military parades, and met personally with PRC President Xi Jinping.
Wang asked Chen to post an article from her website and wrote, “This is what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wants to send,” authorities reported.
Chen was sentenced in November 2024 to 20 months in federal prison after pleading guilty in the Southern District of New York to acting as an illegal agent of the PRC and conspiracy to bribe a public official.
Wang admitted in her plea agreement that she did not notify the U.S. attorney general that she was acting in the United States as an agent of the PRC, that she was located in the U.S. when she engaged in these acts and that did she not disclose on her website that some of its content was posted at the direction of PRC officials.
In a statement to HeySoCal.com, Arcadia Councilwoman Sharon Kwan described Wang’s resignation and the felony charge against her as “a deeply painful and sobering moment for the city of Arcadia.”
Kwan noted that for over a year, she “publicly raised concerns about transparency, accountability and the dangers of foreign influence in local government. During my mayoral swearing-in speech on April 15, 2025, I warned that foreign influence and political intimidation against public officials should never be ignored and that protecting democratic institutions must remain a priority.”
Kwan also noted her request almost a year later during the March 3 council meeting to “place an item on a future agenda to discuss whether Mayor Wang should resign or step down.”
Her request did not receive support from Mayor Pro Tem Paul Cheng and Councilmen David Fu and Dr. Michael Cao.
“What was especially troubling to me was the reaction that followed. Instead of treating the request as a legitimate question of leadership accountability, I experienced hostility and political attacks for even asking that the discussion be placed on a future agenda.”
Kwan said Fu in particular “became extremely defensive and confrontational toward me after I raised the issue publicly.”
Fu and Kwan have carried on a very public feud that has included allegations by the District 2 councilwoman of sexual harassment and quid pro quos with city employee unions and a Fu-led censure action against then-Mayor Kwan last year.
Kwan said in March when she asked the council for a public hearing to air out residents’ concerns about Wang, she “felt that raising concerns about transparency and accountability was being treated as the problem itself, rather than the underlying federal investigation involving the sitting mayor.
“While I cannot speak to what individual council members personally knew, I do believe there was a strong political effort to defend and protect Mayor Wang despite growing public concern and mounting federal scrutiny,” Kwan continued. “Looking back now, I believe the council majority failed the residents of Arcadia by refusing to seriously confront the gravity of the situation.
“Now, with the federal guilty plea involving acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government, it is clear that these concerns were not imaginary or politically motivated,” Kwan said. “This has become one of the most serious public corruption and foreign influence scandals to impact a local city government in our region.”
She added that “this is not about ethnicity, and it should never become about ethnicity. I am proudly Chinese American myself. This is about public trust, transparency, accountability and protecting American democratic institutions from improper foreign government influence regardless of where it originates.
“Arcadia residents deserve honest leadership and transparency from those entrusted to serve them. My hope now is that the city can begin rebuilding public trust and move forward with accountability and integrity.
“I stood alone many times in raising these concerns, but I believed then, and still believe now, that speaking up was the right thing to do,” Kwan said.
City spokeswoman Justine Bruno in a statement Tuesday evening said, “There may be disagreement about how these concerns were addressed publicly, but differing viewpoints don’t amount to indifference, suppressing concerns or a failure to listen. Council members and residents alike were free to express their views throughout, and many did.”
She said that with the federal case’s apparent conclusion, “it is understandable that residents want accountability and reassurance moving forward, and I believe this City Council is committed to providing both.”
Bruno added, “It’s important to understand that the City Charter, not the City Council, governs when a vacancy on the City Council occurs. The Charter outlines specific conditions that create a vacancy, which include conviction of a crime involving moral turpitude, absence from regular council meetings for 60 consecutive days, retaining other elective public office, violation of the City Charter or no longer residing in the district or the city.”
In Wang’s case, “Even today, none of those City Charter conditions have been met,” Bruno said.
Fu, Cao and Cheng did not respond to requests for comment.
Updated May 12, 2026, 11:17 p.m.
