Last month, a woman named Linda Sun was arrested after the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) found out that she was a spy for China.
She worked under both governors of New York, and sources say she used her position to “block Taiwanese officials from having access to the governor’s office, eliminate references to Taiwan from state communications, and quash meetings between Taiwanese officials and state leaders, including Governor of New York Kathy Hochul, who succeeded Mr. Cuomo and who promoted Ms. Sun to deputy chief of staff” according to the New York Times .
A few years before her arrest, Sun was reported to have visited Beijing twice starting 2018, with a Chinese businessman arranging suites and luxurious travel arrangements for her.
She was investigated already in 2020 after the FBI became suspicious.
Last year is when the governor of New York began to grow aware of Sun and what she might’ve done, and decided to fire her. Sun’s husband was also accused of conspiracies with her for China. At this point, many charges were already filed against both Sun and her husband.
Alerts initially began when Sun reportedly “requested unauthorized official proclamations from the governor’s correspondence office,” said CNN.
A lot of people questioned why it took so long to discover and arrest Sun; Rob Keiner, partner at Covington & Burling LLP and chair of its Election and Political Law Practice Group, said “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”.
Keiner also brought up the cultural aspect of this situation. He mentioned that accusing an Asian American as a foreign agent without enough evidence would’ve most certainly caused discourse within other innocent Asian Americans.
Sun had denied these accusations at first, but soon after admitted that she was following orders of a Chinese Consulate General in New York.
Additionally, both Sun and her husband pleaded not guilty during their court decision. They were released but “were required to surrender their passports,” said the New York Times.
Another accusation was made against Sun: prosecutors claimed she took unauthorized invitation letters from the government’s office and gave it to the Chinese officials to make an easier travel method.
There are countless other accusations regarding Sun and her husband’s secret relationship with China that ultimately led to their numerous charges in court.
Current New York governors also expressed shock and outrage at Sun’s reckless behavior.
This was a huge deal, because now the U.S is suspecting that there is more than one spy, and they are therefore now working and investigating to find the rest.
Agents from China were reported to be sending Sun and her husband delicious meals multiple times, and paying for her million-dollar trips to different places.
Now, according to The Hill, Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo “thinks there may be more international spies working in the United States”.