On October 16, 2026, Zhao Lingyun, former Deputy Secretary of the Hubei Provincial Committee and Director of the Provincial Party Committee’s Policy Research Office, was investigated. Prior to that, on August 28, Zhang Meng, former Deputy Secretary of the Hubei Provincial Committee and Deputy Secretary of the Provincial Government, voluntarily surrendered. On September 8, Jin Xiangjun, former Governor of Shanxi Province, was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve; Jin Xiangjun fell from grace while in office on April 12, 2025. On September 23, 2026, it was officially announced that Sun Jianhua, former Deputy Secretary of the Tianjin Municipal Committee, was sentenced to ten years and six months in prison for bribery; Sun Jianhua was investigated on April 11, 2025.
In the past year and a half, Sun Jianhua, Jin Xiangjun, Zhang Meng, and Zhao Lingyun, who successively fell from power, had all served as important aides during the time Li Hongzhong, a current member of the Communist Party’s Political Bureau and Vice Chairman of the National People’s Congress, ruled over Hubei and Tianjin.
Li Hongzhong has been described as a “political chameleon,” having been promoted by Jiang Zemin’s mistress, Huang Liman, and closely following Bo Xilai’s “red singing” campaign in Hubei. After the downfall of Bo Xilai and Zhou Yongkang, Li Hongzhong shifted his loyalty to the current Communist Party leader, Xi Jinping, and gained favor. In recent years, many of Li Hongzhong’s close associates and colleagues have faced investigations, sparking concerns about his own potential probe and a sense of high risk.
On October 16, 2026, the website of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party of China reported that Zhao Lingyun, former Secretary of the Party Committee of Central China Normal University, was under investigation for serious violations of discipline and law.
According to public records, Zhao Lingyun, born in September 1962 in Huarong County, Yueyang City, Hunan Province, graduated with a major in political economy from Hubei Institute of Finance and Economics (now Zhongnan University of Economics and Law). He has served in various positions in Hubei Province, including Deputy President of Zhongnan University of Economics and Law and Deputy President of the Office of the Leading Group on Finance and Economics of the Hubei Provincial Committee.
During Li Hongzhong’s tenure as Deputy Secretary and Governor of Hubei Province (December 2007 to December 2010), Zhao Lingyun was promoted in December 2008 from Secretary and Deputy Dean of the Hubei Provincial Academy of Social Sciences to Deputy Secretary of the Hubei Provincial Committee and Director of the Policy Research Office. Serving as Li Hongzhong’s chief assistant, he was responsible for drafting important reports and formulating policies, seen by the public as an essential political advisor during Li Hongzhong’s time in Hubei.
During Li Hongzhong’s tenure as Secretary of the Hubei Provincial Committee (December 2010 to September 2016), Zhao Lingyun was promoted in May 2012 to Deputy Secretary of the Hubei Provincial Committee and Director of the Policy Research Office. After Li Hongzhong was transferred to Tianjin as Party Secretary, Zhao Lingyun returned to work at universities in 2017, successively serving as Deputy Secretary and President of Hubei University, and later as President, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee, and Secretary of the Party Committee of Central China Normal University.
On August 28, 2026, the website of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party of China reported that Zhang Meng, former Advisor of Hubei Provincial Government, voluntarily surrendered and was under investigation for serious violations of discipline and law.
According to public records, Zhang Meng, born in December 1962 in Songzi, Jingzhou City, Hubei Province, graduated with a major in statistical economics from Hubei Business School. He served for 25 years from August 1991 to May 2016 in the Hubei Provincial Government Office.
During Li Hongzhong’s tenure as Deputy Secretary and Governor of Hubei Province (from December 2007 to December 2010), Zhang Meng was promoted in December 2008 from Director of the Emergency Office of the Hubei Provincial Government (Deputy Division Level) and Director of the General Duty Room of the Office to Deputy Director and Member of the Party Group of the Office of the Hubei Provincial Government in October 2010, he was promoted to Deputy Secretary of the Hubei Provincial Committee in April 2013 and continued to serve as Deputy Secretary of the Provincial Committee and concurrently as Director of the Hubei Provincial Letters and Visits Bureau.
Before Li Hongzhong was transferred to Secretary of the Tianjin Municipal Committee in September 2016, Zhang Meng was promoted in May 2016 to Director and Party Group Secretary of the Hubei Provincial Department of Land and Resources; he later became an Advisor in the Hubei Provincial Government in April 2022.
On April 12, 2025, Jin Xiangjun, Deputy Secretary of the Shanxi Provincial Committee and Governor, fell from grace while in office. On September 8, 2026, Jin Xiangjun was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve; the official report disclosed that he embezzled 148 million yuan.
Jin Xiangjun, born in July 1964 in Jianghua, Yongzhou City, Hunan Province, had a career path that spanned multiple provinces and cities, including Sichuan, Hainan, Guangxi, Tianjin, Shanxi, and more.
In January 2018, after working in Guangxi for 20 years, Jin Xiangjun was transferred as Deputy Mayor of Tianjin; Li Hongzhong was the Party Secretary of Tianjin at the time, and Zhang Guoqing was the Mayor of Tianjin.
In January 2021, Jin Xiangjun was promoted to Tianjin Municipal Committee Standing Committee and Secretary-General, becoming a close aide of Li Hongzhong. A year later, in March 2022, Jin Xiangjun was appointed Deputy Secretary of the Tianjin Municipal Committee, serving as Li Hongzhong’s deputy; he continued to concurrently hold the position of Secretary-General of the Tianjin Municipal Committee until stepping down in June 2022.
Around the same time Jin Xiangjun was officially announced to be under investigation, on April 11, 2025, Sun Jianhua, former Deputy Secretary of the Tianjin Municipal Committee and former Director of the Municipal Party Committee’s Letters and Visits Office and the Municipal Government’s Letters and Visits Office, was investigated. On September 23, 2026, Sun Jianhua was sentenced to ten years and six months in prison for bribery.
Sun Jianhua, born in April 1966 in Bazhou, Hebei, previously held various positions such as Standing Committee of Dagang District Committee in Tianjin and Deputy Secretary of the Disciplinary Committee and Director of the Supervision Bureau in Binhai New Area, as well as Standing Committee of Binhai New Area, Secretary of Political and Legal Affairs, and First-level Inspector.
During Li Hongzhong’s tenure as Secretary of the Tianjin Municipal Committee, in April 2021, it was publicly announced that Sun Jianhua was set to take on a senior position in the municipal government. Subsequently, Sun Jianhua was appointed Deputy Secretary of the Tianjin Municipal Committee and became the deputy to Jin Xiangjun, who was then a member of the Tianjin Municipal Committee Standing Committee and Secretary-General. Sun Jianhua also concurrently held the positions of Director of the Letters and Visits Office of the Tianjin Municipal Committee, Director of the Letters and Visits Office of the Municipal Government, Secretary of the Party Group of the Letters and Visits Office of the Municipal Government, and Deputy Minister of the Social Work Department of the Municipal Committee.
From December 2016 to April 2021, Sun Jianhua served as Standing Committee of the Binhai New Area Committee, Secretary of Political and Legal Affairs, under the leadership of Zhao Fei, Secretary of Political and Legal Affairs of the Tianjin Municipal Committee at that time. Zhao Fei had previously worked with Li Hongzhong in Hubei and Tianjin, and was a trusted subordinate of Li Hongzhong.
Born on August 13, 1956, with ancestral ties to Changle, Shandong, Li Hongzhong held various positions such as Standing Committee of the Guangdong Provincial Committee and Party Secretary of Shenzhen, Deputy Secretary and Governor of Hubei Province, and Secretary of the Tianjin Municipal Committee.
As the cases in Shenzhen, Hubei, and Tianjin continue to unravel, Li Hongzhong is inevitably linked to the downfall of his appointed and trusted allies. Particularly with the recent purge of his closest aides, concerns about Li Hongzhong’s own fate in the political landscape intensify. Notably, the downfall of political bureau member Ma Xingrui represents a purge of the Shandong factions, adding further uncertainties to Li Hongzhong’s political trajectory.
On October 13, 2026, Huang Qifan, a high-ranking official from the Shanghai faction and former Mayor of Chongqing who has been retired for many years, aged 74, was officially announced to be under investigation. Huang Qifan’s career trajectory resembles that of Li Hongzhong, as a prominent figure in the Jiang faction with close ties to Jiang Zemin’s family and many influential figures in the Shanghai faction. Following the downfall of Bo Xilai and Sun Zhengcai, Huang Qifan developed close ties with the Tsinghua faction of Xi Jinping.
Ahead of the Fifth Plenum, the power struggles within the top echelons of the Communist Party have intensified, with revelations suggesting that numerous high-ranking officials from the Shanghai faction are implicated in the Huang Qifan case, signaling a comprehensive review of officials from the Jiang era. Over the past year, three members of the Political Bureau, including former Secretary of the Xinjiang Provincial Committee Ma Xingrui, former Vice Chairman of the Military Commission He Wengong, and Zhang Yuxia, have successively fallen from power. Will Li Hongzhong be the next Political Bureau member to be purged? Only time will tell.
(some content adapted and extended from Epoch Times, initial release on October 17, 2026)