Hochul told reporters that she called a high-ranking State Department official to ask that Chinese consul general Huang Ping be expelled.
Deputy secretary of state Kurt Campbell confirmed that the State Department declined to declare China’s consul general in New York persona non grata after Governor Kathy Hochul requested his expulsion over the foreign-agent scandal that rocked her office earlier this month.
After federal prosecutors brought a case against Linda Sun, a former aide to Hochul, on charges that she acted under the direction of Chinese diplomats in New York, the governor told reporters that she called a high-ranking State Department official to ask that Chinese consul general Huang Ping be expelled. Although court documents do not name the Chinese officials who were involved in the alleged criminal scheme, Huang is widely understood to be one of the officials who appears in the indictment.
The State Department said that Hochul had spoken with Campbell, and it said that Huang was preparing to leave New York because his term in the post had ended.
Under questioning from Representative Darrell Issa during a hearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee Wednesday, Campbell said that he believes that Huang was in the process of transitioning out and that he had “left as of last week.”
But Issa cut in to say that “social media yesterday says that’s not true.” He apparently referred to posts from Huang’s account on X showing him at a banquet with members of the overseas Chinese community in New York.
Then, asked if State declared Huang persona non grata, Campbell said: “We have not taken those steps yet.” The State Department press office separately told National Review last week that it believes “the transition to the new consul general is in process, and we expect that to be complete by the end of the month.”
Issa also asked him about a recent report in the Washington Post that linked several Chinese diplomats to the assault of anti-Chinese Communist Party protesters last November in San Francisco, on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit. Xi Jinping attended that gathering, and large crowds of pro-Beijing activists swarmed the streets of the city to greet him, with groups attacking people who protested against Xi.
The Post found that the Chinese consulate in Los Angeles paid for lodging and meals for the pro-CCP contingent in the city and hired private-security personnel to protect Beijing-linked community organizations that were there. The report also said that the FBI is investigating the assaults.
Campbell said that he was “concerned” by the reports and that “actually, elements of that story I don’t think were widely known.” He added that “there are several of these elements that have come to light that are under review now.”
For months, human-rights advocates urged the U.S. government to review the incident, bring federal charges against perpetrators, and take action against Beijing’s direct role in it.
In a statement to National Review, Issa panned the State Department’s response to the APEC assaults. “If they didn’t know, it demonstrates they have no interest, no system, no resources, and no ability to be informed about public incidents of this nature where police have been repeatedly notified,” he said, adding that the other possibility is that State was aware that Chinese diplomats coordinated attacks on U.S. citizens exercising their First Amendment rights and chose not to do anything about it.