Interior Bureaucrat’s History Raises Questions Amid China Threat

Chinese nationals have entered the U.S. through a strategically vulnerable Pacific Islands territory, and a former politician who took campaign contributions from China-based companies now helps oversee that territory in the Trump administration.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly warned about the threat from China, yet a security expert is raising questions about a bureaucrat in his administration.

Angel Demapan, who serves as deputy assistant secretary for insular and international affairs at the Interior Department, hails from the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a strategic U.S. territory near Guam. Guam hosts multiple U.S. military bases.

The Northern Mariana Islands allows Chinese nationals to enter the U.S. commonwealth without a visa, and some Chinese nationals have reportedly traveled by boat from Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands’ capital and largest island, to Guam and faced charges for illegally landing ashore there.

Less than a decade ago, when Demapan was serving in the commonwealth’s House of Representatives, he accepted campaign funds from Chinese companies. Federal law does not allow political campaigns to accept foreign funds. His current leadership in a bureau that oversees U.S. territories in the Pacific, including CNMI, is raising questions about China’s influence within the U.S. government.

Who Is Angel Demapan?

Demapan served in the commonwealth’s House of Representatives from 2015 to 2019 before becoming chief of staff to Mariana Islands Gov. Ralph Torres, a Republican. Starting early this year, he served as legislative director to Kimberlyn King-Hines, a non-voting delegate from the Mariana Islands to the U.S. House of Representatives.

In July 2024, the Federal Election Commission found that Demapan’s campaign received $1,000 from Chinese company Imperial Pacific International Holdings on Aug. 22, 2016. It also found that the company gave $10,000 to Torres twice, first when he was lieutenant governor-elect and later when he had become governor.

The FEC also found that Honest Profit, a Hong Kong-based business that was constructing a hotel in Saipan, gave Demapan $2,600.

The FEC found reason to believe Demapan had violated federal law by accepting foreign campaign funds, but ultimately closed the case since the statute of limitations had run out.

Imperial Pacific International Holdings, which was incorporated in the British Virgin Islands and headquartered in China, has since gone bankrupt. Imperial Pacific International Holdings wholly owned Imperial Pacific International CNMI, a company that operated a casino in Saipan.

In 2019, the U.S. Justice Department brought an indictment against Imperial Pacific International CNMI executives, claiming that they “instigated a plan to deceive [Customs and Border Protection] by instructing prospective hires in China to lie to immigration inspectors, claiming they wished to enter the CNMI as tourists” under CBP’s conditional parole program. The Justice Department did not respond to a request for comment about the indictment’s current status.

“The China money ties are not strategically significant amounts, but cross a line, especially in light of the DOJ indictment of the company,” Steve Yates, a senior research fellow for China and national security policy at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal about Demapan. “On policy, barring substantial mitigating information, that should be disqualifying for a position of responsibility over the Pacific Islands.”

Why Does Demapan Matter?

Four U.S. senators and 28 members of the U.S. House of Representatives, all Republicans, sent then-Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas a letter in November 2023 urging him to require Chinese nationals to obtain U.S. visas to visit the Northern Mariana Islands.

Allowing Chinese nationals to enter the commonwealth without a visa “has made the islands vulnerable to a plethora of problems, including drug trafficking, illegal immigration, and organized crime,” the congressmen, including then-Sen. Marco Rubio, wrote. Rubio, now secretary of state, declined to comment for this story.

The Department of Homeland Security under Mayorkas instituted a new policy called the Economic Vitality & Security Travel Authorization Program requiring prescreening for Chinese nationals, but still did not require a visa. The policy went into effect this Feb. 20, and a Customs and Border Patrol spokesperson confirmed to The Daily Signal that it is still active.

“Travelers under the CNMI EVS-TAP [Economic Vitality & Security Travel Authorization Program] are subject to electronic screening and vetting prior to entry,” the spokesperson said.

Critics say the vetting is insufficient.

“Chinese nationals should always be required to get a visa to visit the U.S. or any territories governed by our immigration laws—no exceptions,” Simon Hankinson, a senior research fellow for border security at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal.

“Their range of spying against U.S. commercial and military targets, money laundering, crime, and illegal migration make China the single greatest threat to our national security,” he added, referring to the Chinese nationals. “Letting them use parole to bypass visas to visit Saipan was a bad idea. Inventing the EVS-TAP program to do the same thing is just as bad.”

Chinese nationals have repeatedly attempted to enter Joint Base Pearl Harbor Hickam in Hawaii, The Daily Signal previously reported.

In August 2023, the U.S. District Court in the Mariana Islands convicted a Chinese national, Jiang Feng Li, of conspiracy to illegally produce U.S. driver’s licenses in Guam. He came to the Mariana Islands as a tourist, traveled by boat to Guam, and got arrested there. Foreign citizens paid him “$1,400 to $1,600 to have conspirators fraudulently produce licenses by the CNMI Bureau of Motor Vehicles.”

China Hawk Governor Dies

The Mariana Islands has attracted renewed scrutiny after its governor, Arnold Palacios, died on July 23. Palacios had testified in Congress in 2023 that the “People’s Republic of China has had a firm foothold in our islands.”

He announced that his administration would “pivot away from the commonwealth’s overreliance on Chinese investment.”

Palacios called for an FBI investigation into Chinese influence in the very government he led.

Natalie Winters, co-host of Steve Bannon’s “War Room,” drew attention to the Economic Vitality & Security Travel Authorization Program on X last week.

“Several ‘tough on China’ GOP congressmen are quietly backing a program that brings MORE Chinese nationals into America without going through normal visa checks,” she wrote.

Winters highlighted a letter from Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, who urged Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to ensure the operation of the program, which he defended as a measure to encourage “economic viability” in the Mariana Islands.