In this photo released by Xinhua News Agency on Thursday, Oct 23, 2025, Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks during the fourth plenary session of the 20th Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee in Beijing.AP
Not even tiny indie film festivals are safe from the long-reaching arm of the Chinese Communist Party.
On Monday, The New York Times reported that Chinese director Zhu Rikun had to cancel the NYC-based IndieChina Film Festival after the CCP harassed participants and their families (particularly members in China) over the inclusion of films that Beijing had never approved.
The director himself was willing to take some heat over the festival, but when any other filmmakers, panel moderators and a volunteer pulled out, and a few admitted they or their families had been bullied by Chinese police, Zhu opted to shutter the event.
The jackboots won: There will be no unapproved speech about China on President Xi Jinping’s watch — not even on American soil.
It’s no surprise that Xi’s thought police moved against art the CCP hadn’t OK’d — Chinese authorities strong-armed Zhu’s previous project, the Beijing Independent Film Festival, into nonexistence in 2014.
But it’s beyond chilling that the CCP could so effectively squash speech in New York City, thuggishly controlling what US-based independent thinkers can say and watch.
The small festival was mostly funded by Zhu; he expected perhaps 70 people at each screening.
Alarm bells should be sounding from City Hall to Capitol Hill and the White House: Xi’s bullyboys are increasingly bold about meddling in American business.
In August, the Times broke a story about a ring of Chinese agents working through a network of at least 53 organizations fronting as “hometown associations” to sabotage the careers of politicians in New York who met with Taiwanese leaders or criticized the CCP.
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