Boston Mayor Michelle Wu’s administration appears to have a cozy relationship with a nonprofit that has repeatedly hosted members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Beijing’s intelligence network at City Hall, a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation discovered.
The Boston Urban Forum (BUF) bills itself as a nonprofit that convenes a “monthly event held at Boston City Hall,” which “invites officials and professionals from political, academic, and business sectors to discuss municipal policies and livelihood issues.” However, individuals identified as CCP members in Chinese government and state media reports have served as moderators and guest speakers for at least half of BUF’s events.
Wu has commended BUF’s founder, Gary Yu, on multiple occasions, and has also approved events supported by Yu and the CCP intelligence arm to which he belongs, Chinese state media reports reveal.
The DCNF did not find any evidence or allegations of a financial relationship between BUF or the CCP with Wu personally.
Wu and Yu did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
“China has installed hundreds of CCP proxies in every major city across America,” Ina Mitchell, a Canadian investigative journalist and expert on China’s influence operations, told the DCNF. “These proxies present themselves as civic-minded leaders working to bridge the cultural divide between the U.S. and China at a grassroots level — but they are anything but civic-minded. These bad actors blend in clandestinely, hiding their true allegiance to the ‘motherland’ behind the respectable veneer of legitimate U.S.-based quasi-government organizations.”
‘Co-opting’
Since its founding in 2024, BUF has held 10 events in Boston City Hall, according to its website, at least five of which have included CCP members as moderators or guest speakers, according to a DCNF translation of Chinese government and university reports.
BUF’s website lists the nonprofit’s address as “5 Congress St., Boston, MA 02203,” which is a government building called the Civic Pavilion within the City Hall Plaza, according to Boston’s website. While the city’s website states that individuals may apply to hold events within certain government buildings, such as the Civic Pavilion, the exact nature of BUF’s relationship with the City of Boston remains unclear.
BUF claims it was established “with support from the City of Boston” by Yu, who helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for Wu’s mayoral campaign, the DCNF reported in April. Wu reportedly presented BUF with a certificate of recognition on April 14, 2024, thanking the nonprofit for its “contributions and service to the community on behalf of the City of Boston,” according to an announcement made by Yu’s company, Boston International Media Consulting.
Wu and several other New England lawmakers were also previously listed on BUF’s home page as “VIP Guests” until June 19, 2025, when they were quietly removed after the DCNF contacted the nonprofit for comment. BUF did not respond to requests for comment about why it removed the lawmakers from its website. However, BUF continues to list the City of Boston as a “sponsor.”
In total, at least eight CCP members have participated in BUF events since May 2024, with some events featuring more than one Party member.
An October 2024 event titled “Boston Global Scholars Workshop” included at least four CCP members, according to Chinese university records. The event concerned “discussions on scientific and technological innovation,” a BUF post on LinkedIn for the event states.
One of the guest speakers was Wang Hongwei, a member of Tsinghua University’s Party Committee, according to his biography, which was displayed on a projector screen during the event and also read aloud by the moderator, footage shows. In 2018, Tsinghua named Wang Hongwei as an “outstanding CCP member,” Chinese state media reported.
Wang Hongwei’s October 2024 BUF presentation focused on his university’s talent recruitment efforts. At one point in his talk, Wang Hongwei displayed a slide explicitly inviting academics to apply to Tsinghua with the promise of funding for successful applicants ranging between roughly $139,00 and $417,000, footage shows.
His presentation also showcased examples of previously recruited academics belonging to the CCP and Chinese talent programs, like the Thousand Talents Plan, which Wang Hongwei joined in 2012, according to Tsinghua. China’s talent recruitment plans incentivize participants to “steal foreign technologies needed to advance China’s national, military, and economic goals,” the FBI has warned.
In May 2025, Wang Hongwei hired disgraced Harvard University professor Charles Lieber to work for Tsinghua, Chinese language news outlet Sohu reported. Lieber was convicted of crimes related to concealing his participation in the Thousand Talents Plan from U.S. government agencies funding his research in December 2021.
Wang Hongwei could not be reached for comment.
[Image created by DCNF with BUF flyers from the nonprofit’s website]
BUF held an event on Nov. 17, 2024, concerning the Trump administration’s impact on U.S.-China policy, according to another LinkedIn post from the nonprofit.
While a BUF flyer names the event’s moderator as Harvard professor Wang Kaiyuan, his alma mater, Peking University, further identifies him as an influential CCP member who served as the youngest Party Committee member in a bureau within China’s former Ministry of Water Resources and Electric Power.
During that event, guest speakers and audience members adopted a dim view of the Trump administration’s policies, according to BUF’s LinkedIn post, and appeared to echo jargon and talking points from Beijing’s mouthpieces claiming the U.S. had “hindered academic cooperation,” “weakened the vitality” of cultural programs, and caused “trade frictions.”
In April 2025, BUF held another event within City Hall concerning China’s political history moderated by a Harvard professor named Zhang Jishun, according to the nonprofit.
Zhang obtained a graduate degree in Marxism-Leninism from Beijing Normal University, according to the school, and has since not only served as East China Normal University’s Party secretary, but also as a delegate to the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), Chinese government records show. CPPCC delegates “serve as proxies for CCP interests,” according to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC), which is a congressional commission tasked with monitoring the national security implications of the U.S.-China relationship.
Qin Hui, another Harvard professor who served as a guest speaker during the April 2025 event, is also a CCP member, according to Chinese state media, and has written multiple academic papers on “Marxist peasant theory,” his Tsinghua profile states. BUF’s founder, Yu, has known Qin since at least September 2019, when both men attended a 10-person talent recruitment event in Nanning, Guangxi autonomous region organized by the CCP, Chinese language media outlet Sohu reported.
Harvard, Wang Kaiyuan, Zhang and Qin did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
“[China’s proxies] use a strategy that often includes the co-opting or creation of forums, events, galas and award ceremonies,” Mitchell told the DCNF. “These feel-good endeavors open up a plethora of opportunities for the CCP’s agents to co-mingle with U.S. lawmakers, police, and titans of industry.”
“If you were to ask me what the end game is, it’s to make sure that captured lawmakers are influenced to lean toward pro-Beijing policies and shape public narrative in support of China,” Mitchell said.
[Image created by DCNF with Chinese state media photos]
‘Agents Of The CCP’
Boston’s Democrat Mayor has also approved the celebration of several Chinese cultural events promoted by local powerbroker Yu and the CCP intelligence arm to which he belongs, Chinese state media reports reveal.
The DCNF previously reported Yu is listed as an official of the All-China Federation Of Returned Overseas Chinese (ACFROC), which is an agency of a Chinese influence and intelligence service called the United Front Work Department (UFWD), according to federal authorities.
On May 1, 2022, Wu celebrated the 40th anniversary of Boston’s “sister city” relationship with Hangzhou, Zhejiang province by proclaiming the annual observance of “Boston-Hangzhou Day” during a Beantown event attended by Yu and Chinese government officials, Chinese state media reported.
Yu read aloud a letter from the Zhejiang ACFROC branch at the event, in part, expressing hope that “overseas Chinese” would “unite their hearts” and “gather strength,” according to a DCNF translation. Wu, Yu and the Zhejiang ACFROC chairman, Lian Xiaomin, had crossed paths at least once several years prior during an October 2020 Mid-Autumn Festival webinar, which Yu organized, according to an ACFROC announcement including photos and footage.
During the May 2022 event, Yu also played a video recorded by Boston-Hangzhou Day’s “honorary ambassador,” Tan Jing, according to a DCNF translation of Chinese state media. Tan Jing is a CCP member and military performer within the Political Work Department of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), Chinese state media reported.
The Political Work Department “operates at the nexus of politics, finance, military operations and intelligence,” according to the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, and is responsible for “collecting and analyzing intelligence information regarding senior-level officers from the United States.”
Yu took credit for proposing Boston-Hangzhou Day, according to a DCNF translation of event footage, saying Wu had been “very supportive” of his suggestion. On the day of the celebration, Wu awarded Yu with a certificate thanking him for his “contributions and commitment to the betterment of the Boston-Hangzhou Sister City Partnership.”
Beginning as early as October 2019, Wu and the City of Boston have issued a series of certificates to Yu thanking him for his community service. Several months after Boston-Hangzhou Day’s establishment, Wu issued another certificate of recognition to Yu in November 2022 thanking him for “serving the Asian community and beyond,” according to the certificate posted on the website of a nonprofit Yu co-chairs called the New England Chinese American Association (NECAA).
Wu commended Yu more recently in January 2025 during a video celebrating the Boston Lunar New Year Festival Gala, footage shows. “I’m so grateful to Gary, NECAA, and the entire community that helped organize this special celebration,” Wu said in the clip. Yu first proposed for Boston to celebrate Lunar New Year in 2023 and was commissioned by the city to organize the inaugural festival the following year, according to BUF.
Yu’s company, Boston International Media Consulting, claims to manage the festival committee, and BUF identifies itself as a “supporting partner” of the event. The festival is also partnered with a nonprofit that lists Yu as a board member called United Chinese Americans (UCA), whose leaders have included individuals who’ve served as members of the Chinese government, CCP, and/or Beijing’s intelligence arms, the DCNF reported in June.
China’s government supports Chinese cultural events in the U.S. to allow “agents of the CCP to craft pro-Beijing narratives where ideological messaging is mixed-in subtly within entertainment formats,” Scott McGregor, an author and former Canadian intelligence official, told the DCNF. “Ceremonies where U.S. lawmakers give their tacit endorsement to United Front operatives with awards and commendations is another soft propaganda tactic used to build reputational trust for CCP proxies operating in the U.S.”
“What most American citizens don’t realize is that these proxies and the U.S.-based organizations they have set up here are part of the larger CCP United Front apparatus that is driving the engine of China’s overseas influence operations in America,” McGregor said.
