China Expels 33 Senior Party Members as Xi's Purges Leave Leadership Ranks Depleted

Record expulsions before the 2027 leadership reshuffle

China's Communist Party has confirmed the expulsion of 33 senior members at a gathering attended by just 279 of the 376 full and alternate Central Committee members originally elected in 2022. Sixteen of those expelled were military figures, underlining how deeply President Xi Jinping's discipline campaign has reached into the armed forces.

The four days of meetings in Beijing ended on October 29, 2026, with the largest wave of expulsions confirmed at a plenum and the highest rate of Central Committee absences in the period since Mao Zedong. The gathering also set the 21st Party Congress for the second half of 2027 in Beijing, when Xi is widely expected to seek a fourth term as party leader.

Among those expelled were former military vice chairman Zhang Youxia, former Xinjiang party secretary Ma Xingrui, General Liu Zhenli, former senior diplomat Liu Jianchao and former industry minister Jin Zhuanglong. Their removal brings losses across military command, regional government, diplomacy and industrial policy into the same political reckoning.

At the same meeting, military discipline chief Zhang Shengmin entered the Politburo, the party's smaller senior leadership body. He is now its only military member. The Central Military Commission, which directs China's armed forces, has been reduced from the seven members appointed in 2022 to two serving members: Xi and Zhang Shengmin.

The combination of expulsions, shrinking attendance and an unusual promotion makes this plenum more than a routine endorsement of party rules. Xi is tightening control while preparing to choose a new leadership cohort from ranks repeatedly depleted by his own investigations.

What the empty seats reveal

The Central Committee brings together senior figures from the party, government and military. Its full members have voting rights, while alternates form a reserve from which vacancies can be filled. A plenum is a full meeting of that committee between party congresses.

Attendance fell from 364 at the third plenum in July 2024 to 315 at the fourth in October 2025, and then to 279 at this gathering. The latest total is 85 below the July 2024 figure, a decline of about 23% in just over two years.

Measured against the original 376 members, the latest attendance leaves a gap of 97, or 25.8%. Many absences followed purges; the reasons for others remain unexplained. The 33 expulsions formally approved at the meeting are therefore a narrower category than the total number of empty seats.

Before the gathering, Asia Society Policy Institute researchers had estimated that 291 members might attend, as described in the preview of the plenum. The actual total was 12 lower. That earlier assessment had already placed the meeting against a background of investigations, expulsions and prolonged disappearances from public view.

Who was removed, and what remains undisclosed

Zhang Youxia was previously China's highest ranking uniformed officer and the senior vice chairman of the Central Military Commission. Ma Xingrui had governed Xinjiang as its party secretary. Both had belonged to the Politburo, placing them among the most powerful officials caught in this latest round.

Liu Zhenli headed the military's Joint Staff Department, which helps direct operations. Liu Jianchao was a prominent diplomat who disappeared from public view in July 2025. Jin Zhuanglong had served as industry minister, a position central to the management of China's industrial and technological development.

The publicly stated allegations remain broad: serious disciplinary and legal violations. Detailed charges against the expelled members have not been disclosed. Party expulsion removes membership and political standing; criminal investigations and court proceedings are separate stages.

The latest approvals bring the number of Central Committee members removed during Xi's third term to 51, compared with 35 during his first term and five during his second. His third term is still under way. The current figure already exceeds the combined total of 40 from the previous two terms.

A military command reduced to two members

Sixteen military figures account for almost half of the 33 expulsions. At the very top, five of the seven Central Military Commission members appointed in 2022 have been purged, leaving fewer than one third of that original command group in office.

The commission sits above China's armed forces and gives practical force to the principle that the military answers to the Communist Party. Its responsibilities reach into military strategy, appointments, equipment purchasing and operations. Removing most of its membership creates gaps in leadership as well as vacancies in an organisation chart.

The latest expulsions follow the investigations into Zhang and Liu announced in January 2026. Zhang Youxia's fall was especially striking because he had longstanding family connections to Xi, experience in China's conflicts with Vietnam and a renewed appointment in 2022 despite being beyond the usual retirement age.

Asia Society Policy Institute researchers Neil Thomas, Lobsang Tsering and Shengyu Wang described the military purge as being in a category of its own. They connected the loss of senior commanders to the practical question of whether an expanding military can be led effectively.

"It raises serious questions about organisational leadership and combat readiness, even as China continues to unveil formidable new military hardware," they wrote.

Why Zhang Shengmin's promotion stands out

Zhang Shengmin's elevation takes the Politburo from 21 members to 22. The body began the current term with 24, but the removal of Ma Xingrui, Zhang Youxia and former general He Weidong, who fell in 2025, reduced its membership. Three sitting Politburo members have now been ousted during this term, the highest number since 1980.

Central Military Commission vice chairmen have traditionally held Politburo seats. Even so, adding a member at a plenum between congresses is unusual: the party had not done so since 1994.

Zhang Shengmin's career has centred on political work and military discipline rather than operational command. His promotion places the officer responsible for policing misconduct inside the senior political body while experienced commanders are being removed.

For Xi, the appointment also supplies a military representative in the Politburo before the next congress. For the armed forces, it reinforces the prominence of internal supervision at a moment when their leadership is being rebuilt.

Discipline reaches far beyond the top leadership

China's anti-corruption watchdog said 680,000 people across the party apparatus had been disciplined during the first nine months of 2026. That figure covers a much wider population than the Central Committee members whose expulsions were confirmed at the plenum.

Zhang Fuhai, an official from the party's disciplinary commission, told a briefing on Friday that more than two million people had been disciplined since Xi took power in 2012 for conduct associated with pointless formalities, bureaucratism, hedonism and extravagance.

Those categories extend the campaign beyond taking bribes. They reach wasteful official behaviour, bureaucratic obstruction and administrative routines that consume effort without delivering useful results. The party's demands also cover whether officials follow political instructions.

Xi warned in January about officials who declare loyalty while pursuing their own interests. Earlier in 2026, he called for the removal of sick trees and described the fight against corruption as a never-ending journey. His public message presents repeated intervention as necessary to preserve the party's ability to govern.

The plenum statement said the leadership had confronted instances in which party authority had weakened or been hollowed out. It credited tighter discipline and Xi's consolidated authority with correcting misconduct and addressing dangers within the party, state and military.

Control, survival and the cost of disruption

Named scholars offer different explanations for why the campaign continues to grow after more than a decade. Their assessments centre on two connected questions: how Xi maintains personal authority, and how he believes the party can remain in power.

Chong Ja Ian, a scholar with Carnegie China, described the campaign as an effort to consolidate and maintain authority. He argued that its future scale depends heavily on Xi's own sense of political security.

In this case, the campaign will continue and expand depending on how secure Xi feels rather than any real issue with corruption.

Ruby Osman, a senior policy adviser on China at the Tony Blair Institute in London, placed more weight on Xi's ambition to build a durable party organisation. In her assessment, he is prepared to accept immediate disruption to preserve political discipline over a longer period.

"It's less about purging elite rivals, more about building a disciplined system that can sustain Xi's political priorities across leadership cycles," she said.

The two interpretations meet in a practical problem. Xi can remove officials he considers unreliable, including people he previously promoted, but each removal creates another post to fill. Repeated turnover makes selecting trusted and capable replacements a central task of the campaign itself.

How the leadership reached this point

The latest meeting completes a sequence stretching from the appointment of the current leadership in 2022 to preparations for its replacement in 2027. Attendance has declined as investigations and removals have accumulated.

• 2022: The party elected 376 full and alternate Central Committee members, and the Central Military Commission began with seven members.
• July 2024: The third plenum drew 364 Central Committee members.
• October 2025: Attendance fell to 315 at the fourth plenum, which considered the development plan for 2026 to 2030.
• January 2026: Investigations into Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhenli left Xi and Zhang Shengmin as the two serving members of the military commission.
• October 26 to 29, 2026: The fifth plenum drew 279 members, confirmed 33 expulsions and promoted Zhang Shengmin to the Politburo.
• Second half of 2027: Beijing will host the 21st Party Congress.

The agenda has shifted alongside the personnel losses. After meetings focused on economic reform and development planning, this plenum concentrated on how the party supervises its members, enforces instructions and chooses officials.

The next contest is over appointments

The 2027 congress will refresh the Central Committee and senior leadership. Xi is widely expected to retain the party's top job for a fourth term, extending his tenure beyond that of any leader of Communist China since Mao.

The plenum called for better training and selection of outstanding young officials. Neil Thomas of the Asia Society Policy Institute identified provincial leadership ranks as a place to watch, describing rising figures as relatively young, technically trained and connected to Xi's political network.

Kerry Brown, director of the Lau China Institute at King's College London, described a generational overhaul. He identified the willingness of senior figures around Xi to pass greater authority to younger officials as a central uncertainty.

For officials hoping to advance, the message combines opportunity with risk. Expulsions create openings, while the fall of previously trusted appointees shows how demanding continued political confidence can be. The next leadership selection will take place under the same discipline machinery that has removed so many members of the current cohort.

For China, the immediate task is concrete: fill senior posts, restore continuity across military and civilian institutions, and turn the leadership's demands into decisions that officials can carry out. The next scheduled milestone is the congress in the second half of 2027.

Key Points

• The fifth plenum confirmed 33 expulsions, including 16 military figures.
• Attendance was 279, compared with the original 376 Central Committee members elected in 2022.
• Zhang Youxia, Ma Xingrui, Liu Zhenli, Liu Jianchao and Jin Zhuanglong were among those expelled.
• Five of the seven military commission members appointed in 2022 have been purged, leaving Xi and Zhang Shengmin.
• Zhang Shengmin joined the Politburo, bringing its membership to 22.
• The 21st Party Congress will take place in Beijing in the second half of 2027, with Xi expected to seek a fourth term.