Intel community assessments these days are taken with a grain of salt, but this one isn’t too surprising.

Not only is it entirely plausible, but we know China was doing this in Canada.

China tried to shape the outcome of specific races in the 2022 midterm elections, reflecting a more aggressive approach by Beijing to try to influence American politics and exploit societal divisions, according to a newly released assessment from U.S. intelligence agencies.

The intelligence assessment found that “China tacitly approved efforts to try to influence a handful of midterm races involving members of both US political parties,” hoping to counter certain candidates deemed to be “anti-China” and support others viewed as “pro-China,” the declassified intelligence community report on foreign threats to the 2022 midterm elections said.

Since 2020, Chinese senior leaders gave orders to intensify efforts to influence U.S. policy and public opinion in China’s favor, according to the report released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

“We assess that these directives gave PRC (People’s Republic of China) influence actors more freedom to operate ahead of the midterms than the presidential election in 2020, probably because PRC officials believed that Beijing was under less scrutiny during the midterms and because they did not expect the current Administration to retaliate as severely as they feared in 2020,” it said.

China wasn’t too afraid of Biden? Shocking.

But the question is what did China actually do?

The declassified report has little in the way of useful information but it does emphasize that China worked to “support or undermine a small number of specific candidates based on their policy positions.”

China focused on Congress because it believes that it’s a “locus of anti-China activity”. Furthermore, “Bejiing identified specific members of Congress to punish for their anti-China views and to reward for their perceived support of Bejiing.”

Do they have names? Probably. But unless they’re politically convenient, we won’t hear about them.

The real question is what tools did China use and did they involve, much as in Canada, straw donors and local activists?

CSIS also explained how Chinese diplomats conduct foreign interference operations in support of political candidates and elected officials. Tactics include undeclared cash donations to political campaigns or having business owners hire international Chinese students and “assign them to volunteer in electoral campaigns on a full-time basis.”

Sympathetic donors are also encouraged to provide campaign contributions to candidates favoured by China – donations for which they receive a tax credit from the federal government. Then, the CSIS report from Dec. 20, 2021 says, political campaigns quietly, and illegally, return part of the contribution – “the difference between the original donation and the government’s refund” – back to the donors.

That’s where the real action is. China’s big assets are a massive database, courtesy of TikTok and assorted hacks, and a sizable ‘ground game’ inside America.