Moolenaar, Smith: DOJ Must Launch Probe Into Vandalism of California Museum

Chairman John Moolenaar (R-MI) of the House Select Committee on China (SCC) and Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ), Co-Chair of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC), sent a letter to Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. In the letter, the lawmakers requested that the Department of Justice (DOJ) investigate the recent vandalism of a California museum honoring the victims of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, and any ties linking the crime to the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) campaign of transnational repression.

“The CCP is the biggest oppressor of Chinese people in the world and it is constantly trying to silence its critics in the United States through its campaign of transnational repression. The DOJ and FBI should investigate the vandalism at the June 4 Massacre Memorial Museum to protect the inalienable rights of the Chinese diaspora seeking freedom in the United States as well as patriotic Chinese Americans who dare to speak out against the CCP,” said Moolenaar.

“The Museum preserves the irrefutable, brutal truth about the Tiananmen Massacre—the same truth that the CCP has spent nearly four decades actively denying and trying to bury,” said Smith. “That is why the DOJ must treat this attack with the seriousness it deserves and determine whether it was more than ordinary vandalism.

“If this attack was planned, supported, or carried out by anyone acting on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party, it would be an attack on free speech, historical memory, and the safety of Chinese democracy advocates living in the United States. America must be a place where survivors, dissidents, and diaspora communities can speak the truth without fear, and we must all work to ensure that foreign intimidation has no safe harbor here,” concluded Smith.

Background

The June 4th Massacre Memorial Museum in El Monte, California was vandalized on May 31st, 2026, days before the 37th anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre. The perpetrators broke in to the property and damaged parts of the exhibition and interior walls of the museum. According to public reporting, the El Monte Police Department has opened the case as a hate crime investigation, and the investigation remains ongoing.

Smith and Moolenaar have previously supported and led congressional efforts to combat transnational repression, including HR 4829, Transnational Repression Policy Act bipartisan legislation to strengthen U.S. government training, outreach, reporting, and accountability tools to counter foreign governments that harass, intimidate, surveil, or coerce people inside the United States.