At times like these, there is only one thing to do: pass the popcorn.

The recently launched political media outlet Semafor has had a rocky start, to be sure. They got a healthy chunk of capital from Sam Bankman-Fried, the FTX crypto king who now faces charges of running a Ponzi scheme. Semafor was hardly alone in benefitting from Bankman-Fried — lots of Democrats did as well — and they couldn’t have known at the time that the capital was the proceeds of fraud. It took Semafor a couple of months to decide what to do, but they finally concluded that they had to buy out Bankman-Fried’s investment and look for new capitalization. The money would have gotten clawed back inevitably anyway.

One new venture and its capitalization came in the launch of a platform promising a sharp focus on US-China relations called “China and Global Business” (CGB).  The funding for this comes from the Center for China and Globalization (CCG), a think tank with ties to the regime in Beijing, Axios reports today — a rather sharp attack from competitors in the same media space:

Semafor, the 5-month-old news startup, is drawingcriticism in the U.S. for partnering with a think tank in China that is known to have close ties to the Chinese Communist Party. The group has in the past obscured those ties to Western audiences.

Why it matters: The collaboration is notable because the organization Semafor is partnering with — and its leader — has a track record of misleading Western audiences about its affiliation with the CCP.

Who says there’s no competition in the media industry? Consider the source is always good advice, and so is resisting the impulse to jump to conclusions in this kind of adversarial action.

However, it does appear that Axios’ Sara Fischer and Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian did their homework. They highlight the murky nature of Semafor’s new partner, Wang Huiyao. Wang founded and runs the CCG and now served on the board of Semafor’s new CGB initiative. Semafor insists that the agreements creating the new platform explicitly protect its “journalistic independence.” Axios notes that the CCG also claims independence from the Beijing regime, but that Wang’s track record suggests a lot less transparency on that point:

CCG claims to be independent but was founded under the auspices of the Western Returned Scholars Organization.

That group is directed by the United Front Work Department (UFWD), a bureau of the Chinese Communist Party focused on amplifying support for the party and marginalizing dissent, both inside and outside of China’s borders. …

In the past, CCG and Wang have denied any affiliation with the UFWD. In 2018, Wang bowed out of appearing on a panel discussion about the UFWD after his affiliation with that department became public.

Wang also does not list anywhere in his current bio on his website that he has been an adviser for the UFWD specifically or that he is affiliated with the Western Returned Scholars Association.

Axios isn’t the first media outlet to raise questions about CCP influence on Semafor and its new CGB initiative. On Friday, the Free Beacon reported on another CGB board member, Zeng Yuqun, a Chinese billionaire with reputed ties to the Xi regime as well:

A Chinese billionaire on the board of Semafor’s China initiative works as a senior executive for Beijing’s “Chamber of Commerce” and has ties to other Chinese Communist Party front groups.

Zeng Yuqun, the chairman of Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., is on the Chinese advisory board for Semafor’s China & Global Business initiative. The media startup’s “independent news initiative,” which launched in March, claims to offer an alternative to Washington’s “hawkish” consensus on Beijing. Contemporary Amperex is a major player in the CCP’s effort to dominate the green-technology supply chain and receives considerable subsidies from Beijing. …

Zeng serves on two organizations in China’s “united front” system, which the CCP uses to wield influence across the globe. He is a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, the leading united front organization. In December, Zeng was elected vice chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, which describes itself as “a chamber of commerce led by the Communist Party of China.”

None of this sounds “independent” of China’s regime, does it?

Semafor has yet to comment on these reports, at least officially, so bear in mind that the conclusions could change depending on their response. Coincidentally or not, however, their site’s front page does feature a critical look at CPAC and GOP messaging on China and an equally critical look at a potential conflict of interest for Washington Post publisher Fred Ryan on negotiations for Republican presidential debates, given his role as chairman of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library Foundation. Sounds like Semafor doesn’t mind a little competitive shot-taking either, nor questioning journalistic “independence” based on financial incentives elsewhere.

If Semafor does comment, we’ll add it to this report. For now, though, it looks as though Semafor keeps looking for capital love in all the wrong places.

Fortunately, we don’t have to look for funding from China or SBF. Hot Air and Townhall Media are part of an all-American company, Salem Communications, and we like it that way. However, we face a lot of headwinds in today’s Big Tech-controlled advertising environment, which is why we are blessed with our VIP and VIP Gold members, who help us fight back against censorship and marginalization.

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