On Tuesday, September 3rd, Linda Sun, former deputy chief of staff to the governor of New York, and her husband Chris Hu were arrested. Shortly after, Sun was charged with acting as a secret agent for the Chinese Communist government.
Sun was released on bail for $1.5 million in the afternoon, while Hu was granted bail for $500,000. Their next court appearance is scheduled for September 25th.
Sun, aged 41, was born in mainland China and moved to the United States with her parents at the age of 5. She is fluent in Chinese. From October 2021 to March 2023, Sun served as the deputy chief of staff to Governor Kathy Hochul, making her the highest-ranking Asian American in the state government.
This news quickly made headlines in major media outlets in the United States.
The House Oversight Committee of the Republican Party tweeted, “Unfortunately, this is unlikely to be an isolated incident. The Chinese Communist Party is trying to target, influence, and infiltrate every department and community in the United States. This is why we launched an investigation earlier this year into Beijing’s political warfare campaign.”
According to the indictment, prosecutors charged Sun with violating and conspiring to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act, visa fraud, conspiracy to smuggle and launder money. Sun’s husband, Chris Hu, was charged with conspiracy to launder money, conspiracy to commit bank fraud, and misuse of identity.
The indictment stated that Sun “engaged in numerous political activities that were in line with the interests of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)”, including preventing representatives from Taiwan’s government from contacting senior officials in New York State, altering critical information about the PRC and CCP for senior New York State officials; presenting awards without proper authorization on behalf of the government of the People’s Republic of China; attempting to facilitate visits to China for senior New York politicians; and arranging meetings between visiting delegations from the PRC government and New York State government officials.
In exchange, Sun and her husband received opportunities for business cooperation in China, travel allowances, luxury gifts, and job opportunities for relatives in China.
During her tenure as deputy chief of staff to Hochul, the indictment revealed that Sun altered the 2021 New York State Governor’s Chinese New Year speech, deleting sentences criticizing the CCP’s mistreatment of the Uighurs.
The speechwriter for Hochul had already included details about the CCP’s violations of Uighur human rights in the draft, but Sun intervened. After her intervention, Sun informed Huang Ping, China’s Consul General in New York, about the issue.
Michael Sobolik, a senior researcher at the Indo-Pacific Studies program at the Council on Foreign Relations, tweeted: “Using Americans to silence US leaders’ criticism of the CCP atrocities.”
“This is a clear example of malicious Chinese influence within the United States,” he added.
Dennis Wilder, former CIA analyst on China issues, wrote on social media platform X, “This is a typical operation by the Chinese Ministry of State Security. The goal is to target naturalized American citizens with ties to China and engage in struggles with Taiwan at the state government level.”
Julian Ku, a law professor at Hofstra University, pointed out in a tweet that Sun was not charged as a “spy” for the CCP for stealing secrets from Hochul or New York State, but rather as an agent.
“These charges demonstrate how ‘influence agents’ are so useful to Beijing in shaping US policy, even at the local state level,” he warned.