Researchers uncovered a network of more than 330 social media accounts linked to China that targeted U.S. President Donald Trump, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, human rights organizations, and other countries to push pro-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) narratives, according to a Feb. 26 policy brief.
The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) discovered the network coordinating to push these narratives between December 2025 and February 2026 across X, YouTube, Tumblr, Blogspot, and Quora.
The researchers identified six “clusters” of accounts that focused on different narratives, which tended to attack political figures seen as acting against the CCP’s interests.
The largest nexus included 151 accounts that targeted audiences in the United States, including ones posing as American citizens and criticizing Trump’s policies, such as claiming that he had caused or worsened the fentanyl crisis. Notably, accounts with few or no followers made posts that generated thousands of replies, part of what researchers say is an “inauthentic amplification network.”…
Researchers Identify Chinese Influence Network That Targeted Trump, Japan Elections
