The nonprofit groups track the imprisonment of Chinese political dissidents and the expansion of state censorship. They speak out for persecuted minority groups like the Uyghurs and Tibetans. And they help sustain attention on Beijing’s crackdown of freedoms in Hong Kong.
The future of their work is now in question as Elon Musk’s government efficiency operation takes aim at an important backer of such groups: the National Endowment for Democracy, or N.E.D., an American nonprofit largely funded by the United States.
Several China-focused nonprofits told The New York Times that the endowment had informed them this past week that their funding had been suspended indefinitely. Money distributed to the endowment was no longer being delivered after members of Mr. Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency gained access to the Treasury Department’s payment system.
The stoppage of N.E.D. funds affects groups all over the world, but activists say the impact on groups focused on China will be especially severe. Such work has become more crucial — and risky — as Xi Jinping, the most powerful Chinese leader in decades, has waged a far-reaching crackdown on civil society and tightened control on information.
Across China, scores of activists, lawyers, journalists and intellectuals have been harassed, detained or jailed since Mr. Xi came to power in 2012. In the far-western region of Xinjiang, officials have detained and imprisoned an estimated hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs and members of other Muslim ethnic minorities.
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