TDFP EXCLUSIVE: Turkey's CHP, Now Led by Court-Reinstated Kilicdaroglu, Registers a New U.S. Office as a Foreign Agent After the Party's Split
A newly formed Washington company has registered with the Justice Department as a foreign agent of Turkey's Republican People's Party, known as the CHP, according to filings under the Foreign Agents Registration Act reviewed by The Digital Free Press.
The company, CHP USA Representative Office LLC, was organized in the District of Columbia on Oct. 14 and filed its registration on Oct. 20. The Justice Department assigned it registration number 7782. It lists an address on N Street NW in Washington.
According to the filing, the office's mandate comes from a written authorization issued Oct. 7 by the CHP's general headquarters in Ankara. The authorization appoints Emine Sahin Karakaslioglu as president of a temporary governing board for the office and directs the board to set up the office and convene its general assembly within six months. The filing says the authorization "does not specify compensation or expense reimbursement," and that the registrant has received no money from the party.
The registrant says it plans to "organize grassroots and community outreach among Turkish citizens in the United States," hold meetings and events, explain the CHP's policies and Turkish political developments to interested audiences, and spread CHP materials through a website and social media. "During Turkish election periods, the registrant may also conduct political outreach among Turkish citizens in the United States concerning CHP and its positions," the filing says. It says the work includes political activities as defined by the law, and that its materials will be in English and Turkish and aimed at audiences including public officials, legislators, newspapers and nationality groups.
The filing lists four officers of the temporary board, all Turkish citizens living in the Washington and New York areas: Karakaslioglu, of Weehawken, N.J., as president; Burcu Yildiz Yenigun as vice president; Esra Yener Agdere as treasurer; and Ozgun Deniz Gunduz Vangilder as secretary. The only expense it reports is the $288 fee to form the company, which it says Karakaslioglu paid from her own funds and will not be reimbursed.
Which CHP Leadership Is Behind the Office
The registration comes after the party split in two this year.
Turkey's opposition has been in turmoil since May 21, when a Turkish court annulled the CHP's 2023 party congress, removed leader Ozgur Ozel and his leadership, and reinstated former chairman Kemal Kilicdaroglu, Reuters reported. Three days later, police forced Ozel's team out of the party's Ankara headquarters. In July, Ozel and 91 lawmakers applied to launch a new party, called the New Party, which Reuters said would be the second-largest group in parliament after President Tayyip Erdogan's AKP.
The filing names the CHP official the U.S. office deals with as Semra Dincer, and lists the foreign principal's address as the party headquarters in Ankara's Sogutozu district. Dincer, an Ankara member of parliament, was named the party's deputy chair for overseas organization when Kilicdaroglu's leadership announced its new 19-member central executive board on June 2, according to BBC Turkish and the Turkish news site Bianet. She holds that title on the party's official website, which lists Kilicdaroglu as party chairman.
That makes the Kilicdaroglu-led CHP, not Ozel's new party, the foreign principal behind the new office.
In a July 29 statement posted on the party website, Dincer said that some leaders of CHP organizations abroad had announced support for "different political parties" and tried to change their groups' names and social media identities. She said such boards could not move their groups to another party without a vote of their members, and called for general assemblies to be held. The new U.S. office's registration was filed less than three months later.
A Second Registration
The new office is not the CHP's first registered agent in Washington. In 2013, CHP Representation to the United States, LLC registered under FARA as an agent of the party. Its representative, Yurter Ozcan, resigned effective March 15, 2023, according to a filing that month. The older registration has filed nothing since August 2023, Justice Department records show, but those records do not list it as terminated.
The CHP's overseas organization office announced on Facebook that party headquarters had decided to form a U.S. organization. The Digital Free Press found no news coverage of the Justice Department registration before publication.
Images: CHP headquarters in Ankara, by Modern primat, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0; Kemal Kilicdaroglu, by Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0.
Yossi Schmidt, Founder and Editor-in-Chief, The Digital Free Press
Hold Everyone Accountable.
Sources: FARA registration statement, CHP USA Representative Office LLC (No. 7782), received Oct. 20, 2026: https://efile.fara.gov/docs/7782-Registration-Statement-20261020-1.pdf ; FARA Exhibits A and B, CHP USA Representative Office LLC, received Oct. 20, 2026: https://efile.fara.gov/docs/7782-Exhibit-AB-20261020-1.pdf ; FARA supplemental statement, CHP Representation to the United States, LLC (No. 6168), March 15, 2023: https://efile.fara.gov/docs/6168-Supplemental-Statement-20230315-22.pdf ; FARA registration statement, CHP Representation to the United States, LLC, 2013: https://efile.fara.gov/docs/6168-Registration-Statement-20130506-1.pdf ; Reuters, "Turkey court rules to oust opposition leader in latest blow," May 21, 2026: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/turkey-court-annuls-main-opposition-partys-2023-congress-latest-blow-2026-05-21/ ; Reuters, "Turkish police force ousted opposition out of headquarters," May 24, 2026: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/turkey-orders-police-evict-ousted-opposition-leadership-headquarters-2026-05-24/ ; Reuters, "Beleaguered Turkish opposition attempts to regroup with new party," July 24, 2026: https://www.reuters.com/world/beleagured-turkish-opposition-attempts-regroup-with-new-party-2026-07-24/ ; BBC Turkish, Kilicdaroglu's new central executive board: https://www.bbc.com/turkce/articles/c9d3zwz3xzpo ; Bianet, "Kılıçdaroğlu yönetimi, yeni CHP MYK'sini duyurdu": https://bianet.org/haber/kilicdaroglu-yonetimi-yeni-chp-myksini-duyurdu-320123 ; CHP, Semra Dinçer biography: https://chp.org.tr/ozgecmis/semra-dincer ; CHP, "Kamuoyuna ve CHP Yurt Dışı Birliklerimizin Üyelerine," July 29, 2026: https://chp.org.tr/haberler/kamuoyuna-ve-chp-yurt-disi-birliklerimizin-uyelerine
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