Evangelista was also an influential head of the Congreso Obrero de Filipinas, at the time the foremost and largest trade federation in the Philippines, having served as secretary for multiple years.

Prior to forming the PKP, Evangelista was a member of the Partido Obrero de Filipinas, a Filipino workers' party with increasingly radical leanings.

[2] He was instrumental in affiliating the Philippine labor federation, the Congreso Obrero de Filipinas (COF) with that organization on June 30 of that same year.

Jailed towards the end of the decade, Evangelista was involved in informal talks with President Manuel L. Quezon, negotiating a social peace.

He was arrested by invading Imperial Japanese Army troops along with Pedro Abad Santos and Guillermo Capadocia on January 25, 1942, and executed on June 2, 1942, after an attempt to use him as a bargaining tool in contacts with the Hukbalahap.