Blanche: DOJ Will Keep Pursuing CCP Transnational Repression Until It Stops The United States will continue investigating and prosecuting those involved in the Chinese Communist Party’s transnational repression until Beijing stops targeting dissidents abroad, Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a recent interview with The Epoch Times. Speaking with senior editor Jan Jekielek on American Thought Leaders, Blanche described countering the CCP’s overseas repression as a major Justice Department priority. He said the government would draw on tools across federal agencies to confront the threat. “This is a big priority of ours,” Blanche said. “It’s as it should be.” Over the past year, the Justice Department has charged multiple people in cases involving Chinese transnational repression, including violent attacks against Chinese dissidents, he said. Prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York and federal prosecutors in California have brought several such cases. Blanche acknowledged that these investigations are difficult. Authorities must establish the motives behind the conduct and uncover networks in which identifying one operative may reveal many others. “But that’s why we’re here,” he said. “That’s why you have the FBI,” and the Department of Justice. A recent congressional report cited in the NTD news report described the CCP’s use of physical violence, online harassment, coercion, censorship and lawfare to intimidate dissidents overseas. FBI official Roman Rozhavsky pointed to two cases as examples of Chinese transnational repression in the United States. One involves Wanying Zhang, a California real estate agent accused of conducting surveillance on a son of Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te. Zhang was arrested in Los Angeles on a charge of acting as an unregistered agent of the Chinese government. The allegations remain pending. The other concerns Bronx resident Lu Jianwang, who was convicted in May of acting as an illegal agent of the Chinese government in connection with operating a covert police station in New York for China’s Ministry of Public Security. He was also convicted of obstructing justice by destroying related evidence. NTD reported that Lu had also acknowledged contact with a former director of the CCP’s 610 Office, an organization tasked with repressing Falun Gong. The report described continuing threats against U.S.-based Shen Yun Performing Arts, including hoax bomb and mass shooting threats attributed to the CCP, damage to touring vehicles and threats against performers’ families. It also alleged that Beijing has sought to silence Shen Yun through attacks involving some major American media outlets, large-scale social media disinformation campaigns and lawsuits the report characterized as baseless. These concerns have prompted calls for U.S. agencies to coordinate more closely and intensify investigations into the CCP’s overseas repression of Falun Gong practitioners and Shen Yun. Blanche warned that the methods involved extend beyond direct physical intimidation. He described social media as a powerful tool that the Chinese government has used, in some cases illegally, and highlighted payments to individuals to suppress, harass or physically target others. Such conduct, he said, is a serious issue that continues despite years of enforcement efforts. Blanche pledged that investigations and prosecutions would continue as long as the repression persists. He emphasized that the government’s response would also extend beyond criminal arrests. “It’s not just criminal arrests and putting handcuffs on people,” he said. The response would include Treasury Department tools and other government measures aimed at stopping the conduct. Aric’s note: The video is a related news segment from the World News I anchor.