Congress examines alleged foreign influence networks operating through U.S. activist groups

On a Tuesday evening in Washington, a panel discussion about Cuba's threat to American national security was interrupted by a young political organizer named Olivia DiNucci, who stood up clutching a hand-painted banner and shouted about sanctions and solidarity. Security moved her toward the door as she kept yelling. The banner identified her affiliation: CodePink, a left-wing activist group. The moment lasted only minutes, but it has become the centerpiece of a much larger congressional inquiry into how foreign adversaries—China, Iran, and Cuba among them—use American organizations and activists to advance their interests inside the United States.

DiNucci works as a professional protester for CodePink, regularly disrupting conferences and hearings alongside the group's co-founder, Susan Medea Benjamin. CodePink describes itself as an anti-war organization, but critics argue it functions differently. Christine Balling, a former advisor to U.S. Special Operations Command South, told Fox News that groups like CodePink "essentially act like Trojan horses. They burst in onto the scene, and they're meant to disrupt and destroy from within." She characterized their work as designed to divide Americans and weaken the country by convincing people that American freedoms and ideals are not worth defending. The disruption at the Institute of World Politics panel was, in her view, a textbook example of this strategy—and notably, CodePink posted a video of the confrontation to social media within an hour, turning the moment into a media asset.

The incident arrives as House lawmakers prepare for a hearing titled "Trojan Horses: Covert Foreign Malign Influence Operations in America," which will examine the mechanics of how adversarial nations use American activists, nonprofits, media operations, and social media influencers as proxies to promote their agendas. The hearing will focus on figures like Twitch streamer Hasan Piker, who traveled to Cuba with CodePink earlier this year and posed for photographs with CodePink co-founder Jodie Evans. Both have drawn scrutiny from the Treasury Department. Rep. Bill Huizenga, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on South and Central Asia, framed the inquiry as an effort to "raise the curtain to expose these operations and stop them from undermining our national security, capitalism and the American Dream."

Behind the activism and disruptions lies a financial architecture that Fox News Digital has spent a year investigating. The reporting traces $591 million in transactions across five continents between 2017 and 2025, flowing through multiple layers of organizations into a network estimated at roughly 2,000 groups. The money originates largely from Neville Roy Singham, an American-born tech entrepreneur who lives in Shanghai and has publicly supported the Chinese Communist Party and Xi Jinping. In 2017, Singham married Jodie Evans, CodePink's co-founder, in a ceremony in Jamaica attended by Benjamin and other pro-communist leaders.

From 2017 onward, Fox News Digital documented $278 million flowing from Singham into six core nonprofit organizations: BreakThrough BT Media Inc., CodePink Women for Peace, Justice and Education Fund Inc., People's Forum Inc., People's Support Foundation Ltd., and Tricontinental Ltd. The largest recipient was People's Support Foundation Ltd., a Chicago-based nonprofit with Evans on its board, which received $167.5 million. Justice and Education Fund Inc., based in New York, received $68.7 million. The People's Forum, described as a hub for pro-communist organizing in New York City, received $22.44 million. Tricontinental Ltd., a Massachusetts-based think tank led by Vijay Prashad, received $16.76 million. CodePink itself received $1.33 million, and BreakThrough BT Media, which runs BreakThrough News, received $1.098 million.

These six organizations then distributed approximately $163 million to 52 other organizations and five geographic regions. A second layer of eleven groups subsequently distributed roughly $150 million into four nonprofits and five geographic regions, including $23 million directed to Sub-Saharan Africa. The organizations involved have denied wrongdoing and characterized themselves as targets of anti-communist "witch hunts." Singham has not responded to requests for comment.

The financial flows have been accompanied by coordinated political organizing and media operations. The disruption at the Institute of World Politics panel illustrates the strategy: CodePink posted video of DiNucci's outburst to X, YouTube, and Instagram within an hour, with DiNucci listed as the media contact on a press release offering journalists "unbranded video footage." Balling noted that CodePink's method is to disrupt, generate social media soundbites, and avoid substantive dialogue. She observed that had DiNucci been willing to engage respectfully, she and her co-panelist would have welcomed a debate. Instead, the organization transformed the confrontation into a coordinated media campaign.

Congress now faces the question of whether and how to regulate these networks. The hearing will examine whether adversarial governments are effectively using American messengers to influence domestic political discourse while maintaining plausible distance from direct involvement. The organizations operate legally within the United States, but lawmakers want to determine whether their funding sources and foreign connections constitute a national security threat that warrants legislative action.