Guests - Ava Chen, Pam Furie, Joel Strabala
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A Week Before Beijing: Xi's Secret Bargaining List, the CIA's Opening Move, and What's Actually at Stake
Wednesday on Winn Tucson moved from the highest-stakes geopolitical negotiation in decades to a Treasury Department roundtable in Washington about senior financial security to the ground level of Pima County elections and a bomb threat student allowed back on his school bus. Three guests, three distinct worlds — and throughout all of it, the same recurring pattern: institutions run by people who don't serve the people they claim to represent, and the relentless effort to expose that gap before it closes permanently.
Ava Chen: The CIA's Opening Gambit, Xi's 40-Item Bargaining List, and the Cancer No One Wants to Name
China Watch Wednesday opened with intelligence that Ava Chen — co-host and member of the New Federal State of China — said she would not be surprised had been informed by her organization's own analytical work. She was not speaking hypothetically. She was speaking from specific intelligence, released publicly, that has been almost entirely absent from American media coverage.
The CIA Video Nobody Is Talking About
On February 12th, the CIA released a Mandarin-language video — ninety seconds long, publicly available, targeted not at ordinary Chinese citizens but at CCP insiders. The audience is specific: people inside Xi Jinping's political apparatus who have access to information, resources, and institutional leverage.
The video is structured as a first-person confessional from a Chinese official — someone wearing a uniform, carrying the weight of a lifetime of service — who arrives at a reckoning. The script, as Chen described it, moves through several distinct beats.
"I thought I was defending my country, protecting my fellow countrymen. But the truth becomes impossible to deny." It continues: "The leader who claims to protect the nation is protecting only their own interests." Then: "Everything built on a countless lie."
The video then delivers its sharpest message — a direct reference to Xi Jinping's endless purge of allies, generals, and anyone who might challenge him: "Though anyone with real leadership is destined to be defeated, crushed without mercy." And finally, in language that could only be read as referring to a man who has never commanded troops in combat and whose military authority rests entirely on political control: "The men who never fought are ready to send others into battle."
"The CIA has struck and recently this video has resurfaced," Chen said. "If you go on the internet, you will see people very smart showing this recirculating, resurfacing this CIA video."
The strategic significance is not just symbolic. Xi Jinping's greatest fear is the insider threat — the person close enough to the center of power to act against it. The CIA video weaponizes that fear, broadcasting it to the very people Xi most needs to trust him, three months before a high-stakes bilateral meeting.
"The Trump administration is getting into the head of Xi Jinping," Chen said. "That is how you fight unrestricted warfare. You use the enemy's approach to fight against the enemy. And it works."
Xi Jinping's 40-Item List: What He Thinks Will Buy the Room
Through intelligence released by the New Federal State of China on May 1st and amplified in a short public video two days prior to this broadcast, Chen outlined the deal Xi Jinping has prepared to bring to the meeting table in Beijing on May 14th and 15th.
The list exceeds 40 items. Chen walked through the most consequential:
What Xi is offering:
Information relating to Biden election fraud in 2020. "So the first one is providing information relating to Biden election fraud in 2020."
Assistance implementing the United States' North Korea strategy. "Which means the CCP is ready to betray North Korea at any time."
A commitment that BRICS nations will not challenge the U.S. dollar. "He's giving that promise. We all know how cheap a promise is from a communist."
Transfer of disputed or frozen Chinese overseas assets to U.S. ownership. "Those assets, the CCP would agree to transfer to U.S. ownership."
Commitment to expand Chinese holdings of U.S. Treasury bonds to a target level of ten trillion dollars — roughly eight times current holdings.
Release of Americans detained in China on espionage charges.
What Xi wants in return:
Removal of rare earth export restrictions.
Release of U.S. assets seized in Hong Kong following the 2020 crackdown.
Taiwan. Specifically, a public declaration from Trump that the United States does not support Taiwan independence. "Taiwan is a red line. Anything else can be discussed, but Taiwan cannot."
Continued access to U.S. technology and AI. "Don't decouple with us. You cannot decouple with us. You have to take me as a junior partner."
The precedent for exactly this kind of transaction traces to 2017, when Xi Jinping visited Mar-a-Lago and made his opening request. "The first sentence that Xi Jinping said: do me a favor, President Trump. I want Miles Guo extradited back to China." At that time, Xi offered Trump the DNA of the Kim Jong-un family, release of Americans imprisoned in China, acceptance of over 60,000 Chinese illegal immigrants in the U.S., and financial rewards. Trump said no.
The same basic structure is being offered again. Xi has internally described his strategy as: "Invite the wolf into the house. Then shut the door and turn the wolf into a dog."
"I hate to tell them," Winn said. "If they turn him into a dog, he'll be top dog."
Why the Meeting Is Already Tilted
The United States enters this meeting in a categorically stronger position than it held when the meeting was first scheduled two months ago. The Iran operation has degraded IRGC capacity significantly. The Strait of Hormuz situation has demonstrated American military reach and willingness to use it. Venezuela's stabilization shows what economic pressure applied with discipline can produce. China's silence on Iran — publicly, at least — reflects a calculation that its options are constrained.
Chen's assessment of the underlying asymmetry is not geopolitical abstraction. It is personal and moral.
"You are fighting with a regime that they don't afraid to die. American life is more precious. So that's asymmetric nature. You don't want to die, but they're OK to die."
Her observation about Xi Jinping's relationship to human life: his own life matters enormously to him — hence the endless paranoid purges, the digital firewall, the control of every institution. The lives of Chinese people are inventory. "They treat Chinese people like dirt so they can sacrifice anything as long as their family gets protected."
The CIA video, the intel about Xi's bargaining list, the knowledge of his bottom line — this is what Chen means when she says Americans are already winning before entering the room. Xi Jinping knows what he wants. He does not know that his opponents already know what he wants.
Charles Lieber, Genome Editing, and What's Happening in Shenzhen
Chen closed with a piece of intelligence she said they had not yet fully covered on the show — and which she wants to return to in a dedicated segment.
Charles Lieber is the former chairman of Harvard's Chemistry and Chemical Biology Department. He was indicted and convicted in the United States for lying about his participation in China's Thousand Talents Program — a CCP effort to recruit Western academic talent and transfer intellectual property. After his legal proceedings in the U.S., he moved to China and established a research lab in Shenzhen.
"Look what he's doing," Chen said. "He's experimenting and creating new humans."
The intelligence Chen's organization has gathered goes further. The CCP has been conducting covert genome-editing programs on human subjects in Tibet and Xinjiang — populations already under total state control. Three generations of edited humans, locked down in controlled environments, have reportedly been created. The stated goal: super soldiers with chip implants, to be released into the world.
"You should be scared. And there's tons of things that they do that you do not know. And you will be scared."
The cancer analogy she reached for was deliberate. "Our body has a cancer. That cancer is very aggressive and it's spreading. And how they spread? It's suppressing our immune system. And what is that immune system? It's your freedom of speech."
The communism she is describing, she emphasized, is not China's problem. It is humanity's. "Let's not just talk about America. Let's talk about we are human. We live co-living together on the planet called Earth. We all breathe. We all eat. And right now, our body has a cancer."
Her final word on the meeting: "Trump and his team go and pray for their health. We need to all pray."
Pam Furie: Inside the Treasury Roundtable — What Scott Bessent Told AMAC About Senior Financial Security and the Big Beautiful Bill
Pam Furie is a precinct committeeman and state committeeman in LD-17 — Pima County's largest legislative district. She is vice president of programs for the Pima County Republican Women's Club. And as a delegate for AMAC, the Association of Mature American Citizens, she was in Washington on April 29th, seated at a roundtable with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
What AMAC Is and Why It Matters
AMAC — the Association of Mature American Citizens — was founded in 2007 and now represents over two million members age 50 and older. It is, deliberately, a conservative alternative to AARP, which Furie and Winn agreed had become overtly political in ways that no longer served its membership.
"AMAC Action is a nonpartisan organization that enables conservative Americans age 50 plus to become politically engaged and active in their community," Furie said. "We champion the voices of over two million members advocating for policies that protect the Constitution, promote faith, family, and freedom."
The policy priorities AMAC advocates for include: Social Security guarantees, prescription drug costs and shortages, election integrity, fiscal responsibility, and accountability at all levels of government. Membership is $16 a year — a figure Winn confirmed with approval.
Furie has hosted AMAC webinars featuring Kari Lake and Sheriff Lamb during the 2024 Senate race, and earlier candidates in 2022, making the organization a direct line between conservative elected officials and informed conservative senior voters.
The Roundtable: What Was Actually Said
The April 29th event was not a reception. It was a working meeting. Treasury Secretary Bessent, joined by three additional Treasury Department officials, sat down with senior AMAC leaders and delegates for a focused discussion on the Working Families Tax Cuts Bill — also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill — and its specific provisions for retirees, seniors, and middle-class Americans.
The session was organized as part of the administration's Financial Literacy Week initiative — something Furie learned is a cause Bessent has championed as a personal priority, not just a policy box to check.
"I learned that Treasury Secretary Bessent is a longtime advocate, supporter, and mentor of financial literacy and educational programs," she said. "He really cares about people. He wants to provide education in ways for all people to be prosperous and financially secure."
The roundtable also addressed the fastest-growing category of financial crime targeting seniors: AI-powered fraud. The "grandchild hoax" — in which AI synthesizes a grandchild's voice and calls a grandparent claiming to be in an emergency, needing money wired immediately — has become pervasive enough to earn its own name. Treasury officials confirmed they are taking this seriously and developing guidance and awareness resources.
Furie also brought ROSE — Resource Outreach to Safeguard the Elderly — to the Treasury officials' attention, noting that she had invited a ROSE representative to a recent Pima County Republican Women's Club meeting on exactly this issue. "I was like, wow, that was important to us and this is also important to them."
What the Big Beautiful Bill Actually Does for Seniors
Furie walked through the provisions she raised at the roundtable and that apply directly to senior Arizonans:
The $6,000 Social Security tax credit. Each individual 65 and older receives a $6,000 tax credit on Social Security income. For a married couple, that is $12,000 in combined relief. Furie calculated the real-world effect on her own household: compared to their 2024 tax return, she and her husband received approximately a $3,000 gain in their 2025 return — unexpected money that covered an air conditioner repair and a root canal that arrived without warning.
"Having that return was very helpful," she said. "And you work your whole life. You can't work overtime if you're not working. The fact that he wants to put more dollars back in the hands of the average senior American — that's a really wonderful thing."
No tax on tips. Furie drew on her background as an HR director at the Palace of Auburn Hills — home of the Detroit Pistons — where she oversaw 250 tipped employees who set up events, worked through them, and cleaned up and closed them down. For those workers, tips are not supplemental income. They are the income. "For them today to be able to have extra income by not having to pay tax on tips would be huge."
No tax on overtime. As HR director at a manufacturing automation company, she watched hourly employees regularly exceed standard hours to meet engineering deadlines on products that had never been built before. Solving new problems in real time requires staying on the clock. "These guys and women would be thrilled to know there's more income in their pocket because they did not have to pay tax on overtime. They don't get penalized for working hard."
The estate tax increase. The bill permanently increased the federal estate tax exemption to $15 million per individual and $30 million for married couples, effective 2026. This provision is designed specifically to prevent the death of family-owned businesses — farms, manufacturing operations, small enterprises built over 30 or 40 years — when ownership passes to the next generation. "Think about these families whose businesses they've started from nothing. They worked 30, 40 years and they want to give it to their family and their kids. These kids have to pay all these taxes and it puts them in a burden that they lose the family business."
The Trump Accounts. A pilot program contributing $1,000 at birth for every child born between January 1, 2025 and December 31, 2028 who is a U.S. citizen with a Social Security number. "When your children are 18 years old, they're going to have a very nice savings account. The website is TrumpAccounts.com — or .org — but whatever it is, get this started."
The broader IRS provisions. The bill delivered historic relief to over 34 million seniors and curtailed abusive tax schemes that had specifically targeted older taxpayers. The IRS, under the Working Families Tax Cuts framework, is expanding fraud and scam detection education to ensure relief reaches the right people.
Congressman Ciscomani, the Appropriations Committee, and Why Tucson's Congressional Race Matters
Furie closed with a reminder that earned the most animated agreement of the segment: Congressman Juan Ciscomani recently brought four cabinet members to Tucson — to Southern Arizona specifically — to hear directly about the region's challenges and what the federal government can do to address them.
"That's how important Arizona is to this congressman," she said. "He's bringing cabinet members here to learn about Arizona's issues and what they can do to help."
Ciscomani's seat on the House Appropriations Committee — unusual for a representative in his tenure — gives him direct influence over where federal dollars flow. His opponent in the upcoming race has already characterized the Big Beautiful Bill's senior tax relief as an attempt to steal Social Security. Furie's response was unambiguous: "It's all lies."
"We have to keep Republicans in those seats in Congress to give President Trump and Scott Bessent and all his other people of his administration an opportunity for four years, not two."
For those interested in AMAC membership — $16 per year, available to anyone 50 and older — or in learning more about AMAC's advocacy work, the organization can be found at amac.us.
Joel Strabala: Board Meetings, Primary Season Civility, and a Bomb Threat Student on a School Bus
Joel Strabala, chairman of LD-17 and member of the Pima County Election Integrity Commission, joined for the final segment — and arrived into a conversation that Winn had already started on her own, with a direct and pointed message to primary season Republicans.
A Plea to Stop the Junior High Attacks
Winn opened the segment with something she said had been building in her inbox for weeks. Primary season is here. Candidates are running against each other in Republican primaries. And the quality of the political debate she is watching on social media has reached a level of immaturity she associates with middle school, not electoral politics.
"I'm fine if you're running for a position and you want to tell me why you're best for that position. Even if you want to make a comparison between yourself and your opponent — skill set, what you've done in life — I think that's fair. But when you cross over and you start telling me about the ex-wife and the this and the that and all that other nonsense, you've gone off the reservation."
Her specific argument: every piece of personal-attack content posted in a Republican primary becomes ammunition in the general election. Democrats do not create these attack lines from scratch. They harvest them from Republican-on-Republican social media posts. "Fight intelligently. If you're going to fight, use your intelligence. Don't bore us with your humble opinion about what you think is right or wrong. Nobody cares. And you can tell because six people comment on your post."
"My grandchildren shouldn't be more mature than the people posting on Facebook about elections."
The Board of Supervisors: New Meeting Schedule
Strabala delivered the administrative update that is important for anyone who attends county board meetings: beginning in May, the Pima County Board of Supervisors has shifted its regular meeting schedule. Meetings are now held on the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month at 5 p.m.
A special session was held the previous day — not a regular board meeting — on the Tucson City Council's proposal to acquire Tucson Electric Power. The session was conducted as a public hearing, held entirely online. Strabala had not yet confirmed the outcome but noted the agenda suggested the board was unlikely to support the acquisition.
Voter Registration: Deadlines and What to Bring
Primary registration deadlines are approaching. Those who have not yet registered can do so in person at the Pima County Recorder's main office downtown or at the satellite office at Country Club and Valencia. The state form requires proof of U.S. citizenship and Arizona residency.
Strabala confirmed: when filling out the Arizona voter registration form, you must demonstrate citizenship. This is not optional and not waived. It is the existing law — and precisely what the SAVE Act would codify at the federal level for federal elections.
A Bomb Threat Student Back on the School Bus
Winn raised a story out of Sarita — a student, unnamed, arrested by the Sarita Police Department over the weekend for allegedly threatening to bring a bomb to school. Despite the arrest, the student was spotted on a school bus just days later. Parents who saw it called 911. Their children were frightened. One parent told news stations: "You can't take these threats as a joke. My child is not one to be scared. And he was very nervous."
"Are we normalizing this kind of behavior?" Winn asked. "Have we gotten to a place in our society where we just accept this?"
Strabala's response was direct: "Government is supposed to protect the citizen and provide life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. What government is facilitating, particularly in Pima County, is dysfunctional behavior. And this is just a symptom of that."
Winn added another situation she had been tracking — a girl who was molested at school, the boy who admitted it was allowed to continue attending, and the administration that chastised the parents for reporting it. Both cases are symptoms of the same institutional failure: school administrations protecting process, optics, and enrollment numbers over the safety of the children they are supposed to serve.
"I don't know what it's going to take for education and educators and administrations to start to do their job."
Trump's Endorsement Record and What It Signals for November
Strabala closed with a note of measured optimism. Elections were held around the country the previous evening — and in race after race, Trump-endorsed candidates won their primaries.
"Whoever he endorsed, for the most part — not 100%, but pretty dang close — Trump-endorsed people were winning at least their primaries."
The path to November runs through July 21st. Early ballots will be in mailboxes beginning June 23rd. Registration closes June 21st. The only way to change what is happening in Tucson, in Pima County, and in Arizona is to vote — and to vote all the way down the ballot.
"Let's hope we can make America great again in November by putting more Republicans into office in the state of Arizona and all the way across the United States."
Winn Tucson airs Monday through Friday, 9 to 11 a.m., on KVOI 1030 The Voice.
The CIA's February 12th Mandarin recruitment video is publicly available — search "CIA Mandarin recruitment video 2026."
New Federal State of China intelligence on the Xi-Trump meeting: follow on Getter and X.
AMAC — Association of Mature American Citizens: amac.us | Membership: $16/year for those 50+
Trump Accounts for children born 2025–2028: search TrumpAccounts.com or TrumpAccounts.org
Pima County Board of Supervisors new schedule: 2nd and 4th Tuesdays at 5 p.m.
Primary voter registration deadline: June 21, 2026. Early ballots: June 23rd. Primary: July 21st.