LOS ANGELES (CNS) – The mayor of Arcadia will plead guilty to a federal charge of secretly working to illegally promote the interests of China, federal prosecutors announced Monday, resulting in her stepping down as mayor and resigning from the city council.
Eileen Wang, 58, of Arcadia, was charged April 1 in Los Angeles federal court, but the paperwork, along with her plea agreement, remained sealed until Monday.
According to her plea agreement, Wang admitted working to promote the interests of the People’s Republic of China between 2020 and 2022 by, among other things, “promoting pro-PRC propaganda in the United States” in conjunction with her then-fiance, Yaoning “Mike” Sun, who acted as Wang’s campaign adviser.
Court records show Sun — at the direction of PRC government officials — coordinated with others to promote the PRC’s interests by, among other things, orchestrating a team to help elect Wang to the Arcadia City Council. Wang was elected to the council in November 2022.
Sun, 65, of Chino Hills, is serving a four-year federal prison sentence after he pleaded guilty in October 2025 to acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government.
Wang and Sun worked together to operate U.S. News Center, a website that purported to be a news source for the local Chinese American community. Wang and Sun received and executed directives from PRC government officials to post pro-PRC content on the website, federal prosecutors said.
Wang admitted in her plea agreement that she did not notify the Attorney General that she was acting in the United States as an agent of the PRC, that she was located in the United States when she engaged in these acts, and that did she not disclose on her website that some of its content had been posted at the direction of members of the PRC government.
In announcing the case against Wang, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said in a statement that people “in our country who covertly do the bidding of foreign governments undermine our democracy. This plea agreement is the latest success in our determination to defend the homeland against China’s efforts to corrupt our institutions.”
Wang was scheduled to make her initial appearance Monday in U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles. She is expected to plead guilty in the coming weeks.
An announcement from Justine Bruno, Arcadia’s deputy city manager, confirmed Wang’s resignation from the council.
“The allegations at the center of this case, that a foreign government sought to exert influence over a local elected official, are deeply troubling,” Bruno said in a statement. “We take them seriously.”
“We want to be clear: this investigation concerns individual conduct, and the charges are for conduct that ceased after Ms. Wang was sworn into office in December 2022,” she continued. “Following an internal review, we can confirm that no city finances, staff, or decision-making processes were involved.”
Bruno said that at its next meeting, the Arcadia City Council will select a mayor and mayor pro tem from among the remaining council members, and will begin discussing how Arcadia’s District 3 will be represented until the next election cycle in November.
Wang and her attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.
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