EXC: Inside The CCP’s Training Program For Communist Party USA Operatives

Are America’s newest communist cadres being manufactured in Beijing?

Beijing’s foreign-party influence arm hosted a Communist Party USA labor organizer for two weeks of political instruction. Weeks later, he was attacking the AFL-CIO for blaming China and helping devise plans to penetrate unions, workplaces, and election operations.

The Chinese Communist Party is not merely courting American businessmen, journalists, and politicians.

It is cultivating American communists.

Documents and public statements reveal an organized pipeline through which the Chinese Communist Party identifies American Marxists, brings them to China, immerses them in party doctrine, connects them with senior CCP officials, and sends them back into the United States, where they work inside unions, political coalitions, media outlets, and voter-mobilization operations.

The clearest recent example centers on Cameron Harrison, a Detroit trade-union activist and organizer for the Communist Party USA’s Labor Commission.

In May 2026, Harrison traveled to China as CPUSA’s official representative on a two-week program organized by the International Department of the Communist Party of China, the CCP organ responsible for building relationships with foreign political parties.

The program was not advertised as a cultural exchange. Harrison described it as a delegation of young communist “cadres” from Europe and North America.

Twenty participants from 18 countries toured factories, villages, historical sites, and state development projects while receiving direct political instruction from CCP officials. Harrison said the purpose was to witness “socialism with Chinese characteristics,” which he contrasted with the “decaying” capitalist system in the West. (People’s World⁠)

The delegation began with a briefing from Jin Xin, a vice minister and director-general inside the CCP International Department.

Jin reportedly told the young communists that right-wing parties in Western countries could offer only short-term solutions. Socialists, he said, had a proven long-term vision.

“This is our advantage.”

Jin also invoked Mao Zedong’s revolutionary declaration that a “single spark” could start a prairie fire, while telling delegates that young people around the world were increasingly receptive to socialism. (People’s World⁠)

Harrison called the trip a “transformative experience.”

What happened after he returned to the United States reveals the purpose of Beijing’s cultivation efforts.

FROM BEIJING TO THE AFL-CIO

Less than a month after the China delegation, Harrison co-authored an article on the AFL-CIO’s national convention for People’s World, the media outlet closely embedded in the American communist movement.

Harrison attacked a resolution backed by the International Association of Machinists and the United Steelworkers that blamed China’s “predatory trade policies” for the collapse of American shipbuilding.

He argued that the resolution improperly blamed Beijing instead of American corporations, insisted that China was not the enemy of American workers, and accused organized labor of adopting anti-China rhetoric.

“We cannot claim to stand against racism at home while embracing anti-China xenophobia abroad.”

The article instead urged American unions to adopt a policy of “working-class internationalism” and peaceful cooperation with Beijing. (People’s World⁠)

That position later became part of an official CPUSA Labor Commission report.

Harrison joined Steve Noffke and Kooper Caraway in presenting the report to CPUSA’s National Committee on July 11. The document again criticized the AFL-CIO for blaming China for American industrial decline, specifically objecting to its shipbuilding resolution. (Communist Party USA⁠)

But the report went considerably further.

It outlined how CPUSA members should build influence inside the American labor movement and the 2026 elections.

The commission instructed party clubs to connect directly with unions and local central labor councils, participate in voter-registration drives, and become involved in “getting out and defending the vote.” It highlighted a Detroit operation in which CPUSA members participate in canvassing and voter registration to build political relationships and acquire skills for eventually running Communist candidates. (Communist Party USA⁠)

The report also urged young Communists to enter strategically important industries.

“We need a call for young party members to go into the shops and take jobs as salts.”

The targeted sectors included automobiles, nursing, logistics, and warehouse work. CPUSA clubs were instructed to identify important industries, recruit workers, build the party inside union halls and break rooms, and place Communists on shop floors. (Communist Party USA⁠)

THE CCP’S DIRECT LINE INTO CPUSA

The May delegation was not an isolated program.

CPUSA and the Chinese Communist Party have publicly described their relationship in terms of friendship, history, and political solidarity.

In March 2021, the parties held a formal bilateral meeting involving CPUSA’s International Department and the CCP Central Committee’s foreign-party apparatus.

CPUSA national co-chair Rossana Cambron and international secretary Alvaro Rodriguez led the American delegation.

CPUSA’s official account declared:

“The history and friendship of both parties were expressed and celebrated.”

The organization said the two parties had been working to strengthen their solidarity and relationships for nearly two decades. CCP representatives discussed CPUSA’s ability to attract young Americans, while praising Cambron for sharing favorable stories about China with the American public. (Communist Party USA⁠)

The CCP has also placed its officials directly before American Communist audiences.

In October 2021, CPUSA’s Peace and Solidarity Commission held a webinar portraying China’s poverty-alleviation policies as a “historic accomplishment of socialism.”

One featured speaker was Shen Ning of the North American Bureau of the CCP International Department.

Shen explained the CCP’s governing model, its use of party cadres, and the role played by the International Department in implementing and promoting party programs. CPUSA’s subsequent write-up compared China favorably with the United States and praised the CCP’s ability to marshal political power and national resources. (Communist Party USA⁠)

This was not an unaffiliated professor or independent China analyst.

It was an official from the CCP department responsible for influencing and maintaining relationships with foreign political parties, speaking directly to members and supporters of an American political organization.

BEIJING’S PROPAGANDA ENTERS CPUSA’S TRAINING PROGRAM

The CCP’s narratives have also been incorporated into CPUSA’s formal political-education system.

A CPUSA Online National Marxist School course devoted to China assigned material produced or distributed by:

• China Global Television Network, the Chinese state broadcaster known as CGTN.

• The CCP Publicity Department.

• CODEPINK’s “China Is Not Our Enemy” campaign.

• Friends of Socialist China.

• The Tricontinental Institute.

• Organizations defending Beijing’s positions on Taiwan, Xinjiang, and the AUKUS security partnership.

One assigned document came directly from the CCP Publicity Department and was titled “The CPC, Its Mission and Contributions.” (Communist Party USA⁠)

The same Marxist school trained members to build CPUSA clubs inside workplaces and working-class neighborhoods.

CPUSA’s course materials described those clubs as the mechanism for bringing the party’s strategy and policies to “masses of working people,” eventually reaching millions. (Communist Party USA⁠)

The structure is difficult to ignore.

CCP propaganda materials are used to educate American Communist organizers. Those organizers are then trained to carry party doctrine into neighborhoods, workplaces, unions, and broader political movements.

THE AMERICAN COMMUNIST WHO BECAME A CHINA DAILY REPORTER

The career of Dylan Austin Walker, known in China as Wu Danran, offers another example of how Beijing elevates useful American Marxists.

Walker, a Massachusetts native, joined Communist Party USA at age 18 after becoming deeply interested in Mao Zedong and Chinese communist ideology. He was elected as a delegate to CPUSA annual Conventions in served as his club’s Secretary for Information, with responsibilities including “special outreach to workers and scholars in China.”

Chinese state media has repeatedly promoted him as an American Communist who admires the CCP. China’s Foreign Ministry published a glowing profile in which Walker credited China’s development to Communist Party leadership and praised Beijing’s “community with a shared future for mankind” doctrine. (China Foreign Affairs⁠)

Walker eventually became a reporter for China Daily, the Chinese state newspaper registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act in the United States.

In June 2024, China Daily released a video specifically presenting its own reporter as an American Communist Party member and allowing him to recount his path into the party. (China Daily⁠)

That same year, Walker appeared as the unnamed American participant in a “Go Jiangsu” foreign-influencer delegation organized by China Daily and Chinese provincial propaganda officials.

The program sought to turn foreign participants into favorable storytellers for China. Public-facing coverage initially identified the nationalities of participants but omitted the American’s name. Chinese-language reporting ultimately revealed the American to be Walker, an American Communist who worked for the state-media organization behind the tour.