How the CCP pays influencers to attack Falun Gong and Shen Yun

Tim Pool, the host of the wildly popular “TimCast” on YouTube, boasting over 4 million subscribers and 3 billion views on his three channels, exposed how the Chinese Communist Party pays off influencers to push its narrative, such as attacking the Falun Gong and Shen Yun.

During an episode of his show, Pool shared how the CCP unsuccessfully tried to recruit him — an explosive revelation that essentially went under the radar.

Every one of the 10 New York Times articles attacking Shen Yun has been artificially promoted by CCP bots.

Pool revealed that the CCP has a task force devoted to attacking the Falun Gong.

The Falun Gong people were handing out flyers and stuff, and it’s funny because China started hiring YouTubers. They offered — I’m pretty sure I got offered this at one point — they said they’d give me $200 to post a video to my YouTube channel.

He continued:

It was a video of a white dude complaining about this group. And I’m thinking, "I’m not posting this to my channel." But a lot of people were like, "Two hundred bucks, I’m gonna take it."

New York Times and CCP collusion

Joshua Philipp, the host of “Crossroads,” had a similar story about how the CCP boosted the New York Times’ recent hit pieces on Shen Yun.

Since August 2024, the New York Times has ramped up attacks on Shen Yun Performing Arts, a renowned organization dedicated to reviving traditional Chinese culture before the Chinese Communist Party regime took over, uprooting traditional culture and violently silencing dissent. The frequency of the hit pieces borders on an obsession — publishing 10 hit pieces on the topic within the past six months alone.

These pieces, authored by the so-called investigative reporters Nicole Hong and Michael Rothfeld, allege mistreatment of performers and financial improprieties within Shen Yun. Over 60% of Hong’s articles since August have focused solely on discrediting Shen Yun. Performers quoted in these articles have since spoken out against the Times’ shoddy reporting, calling it misleading and inaccurate.

Interestingly, Hong’s father is a visiting professor at CCP-affiliated Zhejiang University and Jiangxi Normal University in China. The former is a public university affiliated with China’s Ministry of Education, while the latter is co-sponsored by the Ministry of Education and the communist Jiangxi Provincial Government.

It would be shocking if they didn’t have any pro-CCP bias.

Epoch Times investigative reporter Joshua Philipp explains:

A network of thousands of CCP-linked accounts — fake accounts, some of [which] may be operated by Chinese spies on the internet, were promoting the New York Times. The New York Times was writing hit pieces on Shen Yuan Performing Arts, which the CCP is targeting. As a result, Shen Yun got targeted with bomb threats and death threats, but the New York Times is not covering that. Instead, they're using these hit pieces targeting Shen Yun doing the exact thing the CCP wants, and then the Chinese Communist Party-linked accounts are promoting the New York Times articles. Thousands of these fake accounts tied to the CCP. Some of them have now been removed by X. This is confirmed, our investigation has shown.

CCP ‘Twitter bots’

According to the report that Phillip is referring to, over the past month, X has removed thousands of accounts suspected of being linked to the CCP. These accounts primarily promoted articles from the New York Times critical of Shen Yun, which showcases traditional Chinese culture and exposes CCP human rights abuses. One Chinese-language article attacking Shen Yun became the most shared New York Times piece on X in over a year, amplified by these banned fake accounts.

Cybersecurity experts said the activity resembled a nation-state automated bot attack. X has confirmed it removes millions of accounts weekly for spam and manipulation violations, including these. CCP bots artificially promoted every one of the 10 Times articles attacking Shen Yun.

The CCP’s motivation is Shen Yun’s connection to Falun Gong, a group it has sought to “eradicate” since 1999 to maintain state atheism. China has detained Falun Gong practitioners for “re-education through labor,” tortured 2,000 to death as of 2009, and killed 65,000 to harvest their organs from 2000 to 2008 alone.

Xi’s propaganda escalation

Whistleblowers with ties to CCP security confirmed a 2022 campaign launched by Xi Jinping to discredit Falun Gong overseas, using Western media and social media platforms like X. The New York Times articles align with this effort.

Data analysis revealed that 80% of accounts sharing these articles had zero followers, indicating bot activity. Other signs of inauthenticity included repetitive posts across accounts and crude anti-Falun Gong content mirroring CCP propaganda. Some accounts, active since 2019, shifted to exclusively anti-Falun Gong posts over time, often using stolen or AI-generated profile images.

New bot accounts continue to emerge, leveraging AI to create believable profiles and amplify content efficiently. Even accounts with over 10,000 followers showed inauthentic behavior, often hijacked, purchased, or repurposed from older, dormant profiles. This operation reflects a bold escalation, with the CCP increasingly operating openly rather than in the shadows, raising significant concerns about foreign influence on American platforms.