Lonely at the Top: Xi Jinping's Anti-Corruption Purge Reaches Beijing's Highest Ranks

Last week, Chinese state television showed Beijing's deputy mayor, Xia Linmao, sitting in a meeting with Walmart CEO John Furner and other American executives, nodding and taking notes while his boss urged the group to do more business in the capital. Now Xia has vanished from public life, the latest official swept up in an anti-corruption campaign that has reached a former top judge, a spy chief, dozens of military generals, and even the officials whose job is to root out graft.

Across China, party officials are wondering in hushed tones who is next. The purge has climbed into the highest levels of the Communist Party and has toppled people seen as close to Xi Jinping. The one person who does not need to worry about his future is Xi himself. Unlike US President Donald Trump, who is fighting to protect his party in the midterm elections and is barred from serving more than two terms, Xi, 73, presides over the world's second-biggest economy with his position looking more secure than ever.

He carries that confidence into a closed-door meeting this week of more than 200 members of the party elite in Beijing, a gathering expected to strengthen both his authority and his signature anti-corruption drive. Attendance will be at a historic low, because so many people who would normally be there have been removed. The meeting is watched closely because it comes a year before a more important party gathering next fall, where Xi is expected to arrange an unprecedented fourth term. After years of purges, few if any figures or factions remain who could stand against him.

Since Xi took power more than 14 years ago, millions of rank-and-file officials have been purged. In 2022 he called on the party to "turn the blade inward" and investigate those responsible for enforcing discipline. He remains unsatisfied. Earlier this year he told cadres that the corruption problem "remains grave," warned of many "two-faced people" still in the party, and promised a "never-ending struggle."

The pace and scale have reached levels not seen in decades. Data from the party's Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) shows that between 2012 and 2022, more than 500 ministerial-level officials were probed, convicted, removed, and expelled. In just the last three years, more than 410 have been purged. The Central Military Commission, normally seven members, is down to two, one of them Xi. The 24-member Politburo has shrunk to 21.

Over the past three weeks, the CCDI has issued near-daily updates on arrests, new investigations, and expulsions. The probe of Huang Qifan sent shockwaves through political circles. Huang was the longtime mayor of Chongqing, regarded as a consummate survivor who served under six party secretaries and watched two of them go to jail, one a former rival of Xi. In retirement he was a fixture at conferences and on television, offering views on the economy. Since his fall, people who knew him have scrubbed mentions of him from their social media, a common practice in China.

Others disappear long before any announcement. Ma Xingrui, an aerospace engineer who rose to run the vast western region of Xinjiang, was not seen in public for five months before authorities announced his investigation in April. A corruption investigation almost always ends a political career, and guilty officials are kept out of public view even after serving their sentences. Authorities have also shown willingness to use the death penalty: in May, two former defense ministers, Wei Fenghe and Li Shangfu, received suspended death sentences with a two-year reprieve after bribery convictions.

The purges have left younger officials with fewer senior figures to offer patronage, protection, and advancement, and Xi, unlike his predecessors, has no apparent heir. Deng Yuwen, a former deputy editor of the party's Study Times, told CNN that this may suit Xi: younger people now all listen to him, and whoever he promotes will become a loyalist, with plenty of time to make them so. This week's meeting is the next place to watch for who remains.