On Sept. 30, Philadelphia’s Office of Immigrant Affairs plans to hoist the red flag emblazoned with the star of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in front of city hall to celebrate the anniversary of the establishment of the CCP. 

You might think this is some sort of sick joke, but no. It’s not even the first; the City of Brotherly Appeasement has flown the CCP flag twice before (in 2017 and 2019). It was a disgrace then, and it’s a disgrace now. All city residents should reject the leadership of Philadelphia’s campaign to betray our founding principles to virtue signal tolerance and diversity — a demonstration of weakness that China is only too happy to exploit. 

In Philadelphia, we hoist many things, notably cheesesteaks, Super Bowl flags and occasionally ourselves on greased streetlight poles in moments of celebration. Historically, Philadelphians jubilantly lifted the first printed copies of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution fresh from John Dunlap’s press. All of these raisings carried more than a little air of defiance against the sort of authoritarianism represented by the CCP. 

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Yet as we prepare to celebrate our nation’s 250th anniversary next year, that quintessential spirit of 1776 appears to be in jeopardy. Communist China has emerged under President Xi Jinping as the polar opposite of everything Philadelphia has traditionally represented. The CCP is increasingly recognized as the single greatest national security threat to the United States in the 21st century. 

The proposed event is being sponsored by the Pennsylvania United Chinese Coalition, which is part of a network of such organizations attempting to boost the CCP’s reputation and reach within the U.S. under the guise of cultural exchange. But their website also reveals their staunch opposition to Taiwan’s independence and their commitment to "peaceful" cross-strait unification. 

The flag-raising has been justified as a demonstration of support for Philadelphia’s strong and vibrant Chinese community, but it is no such thing. The city already has appropriate celebrations for Chinese Philadelphians, notably the Lantern Festival highlighting traditional culture that has become so popular it is now an annual event that benefits the upkeep of Philadelphia landmarks. 

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Even more discordantly, many Chinese Americans are in Philadelphia because they wanted the freedom and opportunity denied to them by the CCP. Very few such individuals seem to have much interest in celebrating the regime that persecuted them, let alone returning to China. This flag-raising is at best a veiled insult to them and at worst a chilling reminder that the CCP is here in the city where they found refuge. 

Just because the raising of the CCP flag has happened before is no justification for doing it again this year of all years. Whatever hopes there might have been for cultural or economic exchange in the past, we can harbor no such illusions about what such outreach from China means now. 

Less than a mile from City Hall — the site of the proposed CCP flag-raising — Betsy Ross stitched the first American flag in a small house on Arch Street, legendarily at the direct request of George Washington. The Stars and Stripes was then adopted by the nascent United States on June 14, 1777, and was proudly flown during the Revolutionary War that brought us our independence. Almost adjacent to Betsy Ross’s house is the site of Dunlap’s press that disseminated the Declaration of Independence in 1776 and the Constitution in 1788. 

At this critical moment in America’s history, we are both approaching our semiquincentennial (we might as well learn to pronounce that now) and coming to grips with the threat posed to us by China. Rather than defiling this sacred ground, this birthplace of liberty, by bending the knee to Beijing, Philadelphia’s Office of Immigrant Affairs would do much better to reject any request to raise aloft an odious symbol of communist oppression and instead gather all Philadelphians together for a celebration of that timeless symbol of liberty: the American flag.