Meet The Activists Opposing Virginia Data Centers. Some Have Marxist Ties.

Some Virginia anti-data center activists and candidates are seemingly linked to a Marxist-Leninist party tied to the Chinese Communist Party, according to public records, social media and news reports.

Local Virginia political figures have appeared in connection with the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), a Marxist-Leninist organization that seeks to replace US capitalism with socialism. Data center opposition has intensified across Virginia over concerns about rising electricity demand and costs, water use, noise pollution and facilities being built near homes, according to the Virginia Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. Those issues are especially pronounced in Northern Virginia, where the state’s data center industry is focused.

These local figures include Frederick County Board of Supervisors candidate Alexander Ritter, Winchester activist Klio Stroubakis and grassroots political organizer Jack Tensley.

Each of these local figures is also connected with the local anti-data center Protect Frederick organization. Protect Frederick is an “independent community effort by Frederick County residents” to oppose data center projects, according to the organization’s website.

Tensley, Ritter and Stroubakis are all among the 2,503 signatures on Protect Frederick’s petition to “protect our community from the unchecked expansion of large-scale data centers.”

Ritter denied the allegation that Protect Frederick members were associated with the PSL in comments to the DCNF.

Stroubakis, Tensley, the Party for Socialism and Liberation and the U.S. Department of Justice each did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s requests for comment.

‘It Is A Matter Of Life And Death’

Beyond local activism, the PSL’s program materials leave little doubt about the group’s goals.

“The aim of the PSL is to abolish the corrupt, rotten and anti-people capitalist economy, state and governmental system, and replace it with one dedicated to meeting the needs of the people — a socialist system,” the PSL said on its official program page.

To become a PSL member, interested candidates must undergo “months-long training and vetting process for entry alongside standards of revolutionary discipline” as part of a “democratic centralist cadre model,” according to an April 2024 article published by Marxist outlet Cosmonaut Magazine. “It is a matter of life and death to rapidly organize and politicize the masses.”

PSL’s network blocked $23.6 billion in artificial intelligence infrastructure projects by inserting itself into local protests in 14 states, a June 2026 Bitcoin Policy Institute report found.

‘The PSL Is Such A Distraction’

Ritter, a lifelong Frederick County resident, is running as an independent for Board Chairman in the Nov. 3 special election, the Winchester Star reported.

He led a June 3 Winchester data center protest and helped make Protect Frederick’s website, according to the Winchester Star. Now he’s running for local office on an anti-data center platform.

“My org is not affiliated with the PSL in any way. We have a variety of people who have spoken at Board meetings and they come from all sorts of backgrounds,” Ritter told the DCNF in an email, after he was asked if he could comment on the affiliations of some of Protect Frederick’s participants with the PSL.

He responded to the DCNF as “The Protect Frederick Team” in an email.

The data centers aren’t a partisan issue and there’s a problem with them being framed that way, Ritter claimed. Ritter previously voted for both parties, or those who served his “interests.”

“I vote for pragmatic solutions,” Ritter told the DCNF, when asked to clarify his ideology. “I’m running for a Board position. That race is about zoning and budgets, not ideology. That to me is practical.”

His X account still describes him as a “Freudo-Marxist” according to his X profile. His most recent tweet is from Jan. 2019.

He defined Freudo-Marxism as “a combination of Freudian Psychology with Marxist ideas,” and explained that the description was merely a philosophy joke. “It wasn’t really a serious description of what I thought. I actually thought Freud was absurd,” he told the DCNF.

“When you say ‘transgender debate,’ I hear ‘Jewish question.’ TERFs [Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminists] and transphobes are just fascist songs in a different key,” an Oct. 2018 X post reads, reposted by Ritter. “Loving the trans people in our lives is anti-fascism.”

A second repost appeared to carry the same left-wing ideology.

“Reminder: no trans person’s gender expression has ever hurt anyone in a bathroom or anywhere. Anti-trans measures cause violence, entrench patriarchy & pain,” another October 2018 repost on his X account read in part.

Ritter had been photographed wearing plaid in the middle of a group of protestors on June 5 promoting an anti-data center protest, according to the PSL chapters’ joint Instagram post.

Another local candidate, Vaughn Whitacre, is featured in the photo with the protestors. Whitacre is an independent running for the Gainesboro District seat on the Frederick County Board of Supervisors in November, the Winchester Star reported June 25.

“Virginia has more data centers than anywhere else on the planet and the people have had enough … The people have spoken: NO DATA CENTERS! This is one victory, but the fight isn’t over,” a joint PSL West Virginia and PSL Virginia Instagram caption read.

The protest depicted in the post was his organization’s march, Ritter told the DCNF, but he deferred to Leslie Spencer, who he called the march’s organizer, for additional questions on the event. He said he was unsure why the PSL chapters posted about it.

He claimed that the majority of the anti-data center activists are local conservatives, and reporters are mistakenly framing the data center issue as partisan.

Ritter argued that industry players developing Virginia data centers, not the PSL, are the real drivers of the issue.

“[The PSL] is such a distraction from what we are actually fighting against,” Ritter said. “I don’t care about a group posting on Instagram. I care about NextEra Energy, REC and Jackson-West Consulting sponsoring the Hob Nob event at the Top of Virginia Regional Chamber.”

Asked to clarify his stance on the PSL posting about his protest, he said, “I think the post seems to about data centers and its resistance here” and told the DCNF to refer to Leslie Spencer for further questions on the event. He did not clarify whether he was affiliated with the PSL and would not condemn the socialist group.

Leslie Spencer is a Winchester resident and vocal participant in the Protect Frederick cause, signing Protect Frederick’s anti-data center petition on Feb. 22 and speaking at a Frederick County Planning Commission meeting on June 3. Spencer did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

‘Professional Tree Hugger’ Running for City Council

Stroubakis, an activist, organizer and teacher in neighboring Winchester, Virginia, is running for Ward 4 on the Winchester City Council.

She describes herself as a “professional tree hugger” on her Instagram bio, listing her pronouns as “hers/she.”

Her campaign website also features a photo of her holding a “No Data Center” sign, positioned below the caption “built to last, not built to extract.”

Stroubakis is photographed wearing a PSL shirt at a pride parade in a June 6 PSL West Virginia Instagram post.

Stroubakis contributed $85 to socialist Independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ campaign between 2019 and 2020, according to Federal Election Commission receipts.

She frequently pays Jack Tensley coffee, groceries and “stuff n things,” according to public Venmo transactions.

When asked by the DCNF to clarify what she meant by “stuff n things,” Stroubakis did not respond.

‘Socialism and Democracy Go Hand In Hand’

Tensley refers to himself as PSL “organizer” and an Eastern Panhandle Liberation Center “volunteer,” according to his Instagram biography, which features Palestinian flags. This center is “a hub for working class organizing and education in the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia” operated by Justice Eastern Panhandle, Inc. and the PSL West Virginia, according to a past DCNF report.

He spoke out against data centers at Frederick County Planning Commission meetings in January and March.

“My really big fear here is the security risk, its 2026, everything is crazy, we’ve got infrastructure attacks and failures, cyber attacks that happen, I wanna know if this puts a target on the back of Frederick County,” Tensley said at the Jan. 7 meeting.

PSL West Virginia featured Tensley in party merchandise promoting its events in a July 8 Instagram post.

“We really, very strongly believe in democracy, and socialism and democracy go hand in hand,” Tensley told West Virginia Public Broadcasting in a May 2023 interview. “We’d like to give that power back to people so they can have self-determination of their lives.”

“But if we could decide as workers, ‘Oh, no, we want that money to go towards roads and schools and health care,’ then we can really see those kinds of benefits,” he added.

To show support for his cause, Tensley has written news articles for national PSL’s Liberation News, reposted the organization’s content on social media and led protests involving the organization.

PSL West Virginia posted a video of Tensley leading one of its protests in June 2025.

He is similarly involved in anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) protests in the Winchester area, and he led Free Palestine chants at a 2023 protest in downtown Winchester. “The Palestinian people need us to speak for them,” Tensley said, according to Winchester Star.

He began protesting during Occupy Wall Street in 2011, an X post from August of that year suggests.

Tensley donated $172 to Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign, between August 2019 and March 2020, according to FEC data.

“I’ve never been so turned on,” Tensley said in a February 2020 X post supporting Sanders.

Singham and the ‘Red Web’

Shanghai-based left-wing billionaire Neville Roy Singham reportedly funneled large sums into U.S nonprofit groups associated with PSL activities, and he is connected to Chinese Communist Party propaganda entities, according to a 2024 Network Contagion Research Institute report.

Singham moved hundreds of millions of dollars through 67 groups in five continents to spread pro-China messaging, a March Fox News Digital investigation found. These 223 transactions have been dubbed Singham’s “Red Web.”

Top PSL leaders also run allegedly Singham-funded nonprofits. Brian Becker, PSL co-founder, is also the leader of ANSWER Coalition, which is reportedly funded by Singham. Claudia De la Cruz, 2024 U.S. presidential nominee for the PSL, is the co-founder of The People’s Forum, which reportedly receives Singham funding. Her running mate, Karina Garcia, operates the Justice and Education Fund, which is a grant organization reportedly linked to Singham.

The Department of Justice began an investigation into Singham’s financial network and his alleged funding of left-wing activist groups in late June 2026.

Republican Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton wrote a letter on June 10 imploring the Department of Justice to investigate alleged Chinese and other foreign influence over public perception of data centers.

“Alarming reports indicate that a network of foreign actors, led by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is attempting to manipulate U.S. policy and public opinion on data centers,” Cotton said in the letter.