An alleged Chinese agent went undetected in New York state government for years. Why it may have taken so long for authorities to act

(CNN) — When Linda Sun visited Beijing in the winter of 2018, according to federal prosecutors, a Chinese businessman based in the US made travel arrangements for her and reserved a presidential suite once used by First Lady Michelle Obama.

A year later, on a second trip to Beijing, Sun exchanged correspondence with the same businessman and discussed her possible attendance to a military parade, ultimately attending a reception to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

Then came the summer of 2020, when the FBI summoned Sun for an interview.

Sun, a 41-year-old naturalized American citizen born in China, had been working for the State of New York for years at that point. Her roles included being deputy chief of staff for Gov. Kathy Hochul and an aide to the administration of Hochul’s predecessor, Gov. Andrew Cuomo, starting in 2012.

Now, following her firing in 2023 and a host of charges filed against her and her husband in an indictment unsealed this month, the New York state government is grappling with having employed an alleged agent for the Chinese government – and raising questions on why it took so long to bring charges, experts tell CNN, while recognizing the difficulty and time it takes for investigators to obtain evidence.

Sun and her husband, Chris Hu, who is a co-defendant, have pleaded not guilty and their lawyers have said the accusations are the result of overly aggressive investigations.

Alarms raised

Sun held several positions in state government, including director of Asian American affairs. As part of her work at multiple state agencies during the Cuomo and Hochul administrations – and amidst the historically fraught tensions between China and both Taiwan and the US – federal prosecutors allege Sun consistently blocked Taiwanese officials from having access to New York officials, directed messaging to ensure that Taiwan was seldom mentioned or acknowledged in remarks, and gloated to Chinese consular staff that she was effective in keeping Taiwanese requests from being fulfilled.

Sun was referred to the New York State Inspector General’s Office in early 2023 after it was reported she requested unauthorized official proclamations from the governor’s correspondence office, according to the indictment. The request set off alarms because Sun had previously transferred from the executive chamber to the Department of Labor – a role in which she did not exercise duties on behalf of the governor, a source familiar with the matter told CNN.

Sun initially lied to the Inspector General’s office but later acknowledged she had requested the proclamations at the request of an official in the Chinese Consulate General in New York City and presented them at a Lunar New Year celebration hosted by the consulate, according to the indictment.

Such proclamations are purely honorary and meant to grant praise upon its recipient. The Department of Labor fired Sun three months later over the incident, according to the source.

A day after Sun’s arraignment, Hochul told reporters she was shocked and infuriated by the revelations, accusing Sun of violating the trust of the American people and her office and stating she was confident in her office’s background check process.

“It doesn’t surprise me that it took a long time to detect that there was an issue,” said Rob Kelner, partner at Covington & Burling LLP and chair of its Election and Political Law Practice Group.

“A governor and their staff are going to tend to be trusting of the people they hire and people aren’t normally going to assume that someone is working as a foreign agent when they’re working for a governor’s office,” Kelner said.

“People also have some cultural sensitivity around wanting to accuse an Asian American of being a foreign agent, so all those things together make it relatively easy for people to evade suspicion,” he said. One Department of Justice initiative intended to obstruct Chinese intelligence activities in the US was ended in 2022 following a series of dismissals of cases as well as complaints that it fueled suspicion and bias against innocent Chinese Americans.

During the 2020 interview with the FBI, according to federal prosecutors, an agent asked Sun about the trips to China and confronted her with a photo from the 70th anniversary celebration.

Sun allegedly lied about the purpose of her trip, saying it had all been part of her job as an Asian community liaison for the New York governor’s office.

Sun also concealed about who paid for the trip, prosecutors allege, and over the course of several years she failed to make any disclosures about her interactions with Chinese government officials despite being told she was required to do so by state and federal law.

Brian Blais, a former assistant US Attorney for the Southern District of New York and litigation and enforcement partner at Ropes & Gray, said Sun’s job titles might have helped her go unnoticed.

“Just given the nature of the position that this individual held, it also may have made it less detectable, frankly. The Deputy Chief of Staff at the governor’s office just is kind of less in the crosshairs of media focus and other focus,” Blais said.

Building a case

Four years after the interview, the FBI descended on the $3.6 million home of Sun and Hu to carry out a nighttime raid, situated on a manicured cul-de-sac in the north shore of Long Island.

A month later, Sun and her husband were arrested and accused of working on behalf of the Chinese government. In a 64-page indictment, federal prosecutors said Sun conspired and violated the Foreign Agents Registration Act, known as FARA, and accused her of money laundering, visa fraud and alien smuggling.

Hu was also charged with money laundering conspiracy and conspiracy to commit bank fraud as well as misusing means of identification, federal prosecutors said Tuesday.

In exchange for her actions, prosecutors say Sun and her husband enriched themselves and received lavish gifts, as well as successfully promoting their relatives’ businesses both in the US and China in addition to securing employment for their relatives within the Chinese government.

Whether prosecutors can show that Sun did this knowing she was in violation of state and federal statutes will play out in court. But for now, prosecutors have signaled they have evidence showing Sun was doing work on behalf of the Chinese government while simultaneously attending required ethics training by the state, and after being told of potential federal violations during her sit down with the FBI.

“FARA does require proof of willfulness,” Kelner said. “These cases are built on email and text traffic to and from the defendant, any surveillance video that might exist or wiretap excerpts that might exist and financial records. Those are the bread and butter of a typical FARA case.”

It takes time to gather evidence of FARA violations that can strengthen a case like that against Sun, experts say. The fact that Sun allegedly obtained most of the kickbacks in unreported form could have made it more difficult for prosecutors to mount the case in a short amount of time.

Howard Master, partner with global investigations firm Nardello & Co. and a former prosecutor in the Southern District of New York, said the couple’s alleged laundering scheme might have posed a challenge for investigators.

“Sun is alleged to have obtained most of the corrupt benefits from the scheme – salted ducks aside – through unreported income that her husband’s seafood importation business obtained from China and then laundered into the United States, making it more difficult for law enforcement to connect the proverbial dots connecting Sun’s activities benefiting China to the financial benefits she enjoyed,” Master said.

Once investigators determined her actions were not an immediate national and security threat, it is possible that investigators monitored from a distance as her actions continued and more evidence piled up. It all could help deliver a win on a type of enforcement the DOJ has been increasingly focused on, experts tell CNN.

Since 2023, other cases have involved individuals accused or convicted of working for the Chinese government, in addition to FARA enforcement specifically. Last year, two men were accused of running a covert police station in Lower Manhattan on behalf of the Chinese government; three men were convicted of stalking a family in New Jersey on behalf of the Chinese government; and a 73-year-old activist was convicted last month of acting and conspiring as an agent for China.

Blais said Sun’s case shows federal investigators are homing in not just on foreign influence cases but specifically on the intersection of national security concerns and criminal law.

“This is a red light for, or at least a warning signal for, government officials that they do need to be aware of potential attempts to influence their conduct and that if something seems amiss, it may be worth either one looking into it or at the very least reporting it.”

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