[11][12][13] She was defeated in the electorate contest by National's Erica Stanford and not ranked high enough to be elected as a list MP.

Despite losing the Botany electorate to National's Christopher Luxon by a margin of 3,999 votes, she was ranked high enough on the Labour list to get into Parliament.

[23] In September 2017, New Zealand sinologist and University of Canterbury political scientist Anne-Marie Brady alleged in a conference paper that Chen had "close […] connections" to the United Front, a network of groups and individuals and strategy the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) uses to advance its agenda.

Brady cited Chen's leadership of New Zealand Chinese Students' Association, a "united front-related organization", as evidence.

[25] Prior to the 2020 election, members of the group New Zealand Values Alliance distributed flyers in Auckland alleging that Chen was a "CCP agent".