House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith just issued subpoenas to three nonprofit organizations connected to Neville Roy Singham, an American multimillionaire socialist megadonor currently living in Shanghai with documented ties to the Chinese Communist Party. The subpoenas target BreakThrough News, Tricontinental, and The People's Forum — all of which, according to Smith, "have stonewalled the Ways and Means Committee's investigation."
"That ends now," Smith said.
The investigation centers on whether U.S. tax law — which grants tax exemptions and shields charitable donor identities — has been exploited to route foreign money into domestic political activity. The committee has been working the case for months. "For months, the Ways and Means Committee has been investigating how the Chinese Communist Party has been taking advantage of our country's laws through its tax-exempt sector," Smith stated. The subpoenas represent the moment the investigation moved from asking politely to compelling legally.
Singham's network isn't subtle. The man lives in Shanghai. His organizations have connections to the Venceremos Brigade and Code Pink — groups whose sympathies toward authoritarian regimes aren't exactly classified information. The allegation is that hundreds of millions in funding has been concealed through shell companies and donor-advised funds, using the nonprofit tax structure as a laundering mechanism for foreign influence.
James Fitzpatrick, Director of the Center to Advance Security in America, put a finer point on it: "We believe the many potentially illegal activities that People's Forum has engaged in are grounds for a potential revocation of their tax-exempt charitable status." When the guy whose job is tracking foreign influence operations says the word "illegal," the IRS file is probably worth reading.
The question of Foreign Agents Registration Act violations hangs over the entire investigation. FARA requires anyone acting on behalf of a foreign government or entity to register with the Justice Department. These organizations didn't. If the committee's evidence holds, three CCP-connected nonprofits operated on American soil, influenced American politics, and never told anyone who was actually writing the checks.
This isn't the first time Congress has tried to get answers. Senator Chuck Grassley, the former Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman, sent a letter to the FBI and DOJ back in April 2025 flagging the Singham network. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jay Clayton now sit in the seats that will determine whether the evidence leads to prosecution. FBI Director Kash Patel's bureau has the investigative infrastructure to trace the money if the political will exists.
We spent years listening to breathless coverage about Russian interference. Special counsels. Congressional hearings. Cable news countdown clocks. An American megadonor living in Shanghai, funneling hundreds of millions through shell companies and tax-exempt nonprofits connected to the Chinese Communist Party, got none of that energy. No primetime hearings. No solemn anchor monologues about protecting democracy.
Subpoenas aren't allegations. They're legal instruments backed by congressional authority, and ignoring them comes with consequences. Three organizations that stonewalled a committee investigation just found out that "no comment" has an expiration date.