Democrat Rep. Eric Swalwell (CA) suggested without evidence on Tuesday that the bombshell story that was published this week about his ties to a suspected Chinese spy was payback by the Trump administration for him repeatedly attacking President Donald Trump over Russia.
The alleged spy, Chinese national Christine Fang, “targeted up-and-coming local politicians in the Bay Area and across the country who had the potential to make it big on the national stage” through “campaign fundraising, extensive networking, personal charisma, and romantic or sexual relationships,”
Axios reported. “Even though U.S. officials do not believe Fang received or passed on classified information, the case ‘was a big deal, because there were some really, really sensitive people that were caught up’ in the intelligence network, a current senior U.S. intelligence official said.”
“Amid a widening counterintelligence probe, federal investigators became so alarmed by Fang’s behavior and activities that around 2015 they alerted Swalwell to their concerns — giving him what is known as a defensive briefing,” Axios reported. “Swalwell immediately cut off all ties to Fang, according to a current U.S. intelligence official, and he has not been accused of any wrongdoing.”
Fang, who allegedly helped bring in top donors to Swalwell, later left the U.S. in 2015 and returned to China. U.S. officials told Axios that they believe that China’s communist government ended her mission and called her back, perhaps because they saw signs that the U.S. government was closing in on her alleged activities.
Swalwell responded to the report late on Tuesday by suggesting that the Trump administration was responsible for leaking the story to Axios. However, Axios never said that the story was leaked to them, rather, they said that their story was the result of a “yearlong investigation.” Furthermore, one of the reporters on the byline of the Axios story, Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, is considered to be a top reporter on China and has broken major stories on China’s concentration camps.
“I’ve been a critic of the president. I’ve spoken out against him. I was on both committees that worked to impeach him. The timing feels like that should be looked at,” Swalwell told Politico. “What it appears though that this person — as the story reports — was unsuccessful in whatever they were trying to do. But if intelligence officials are trying to weaponize someone’s cooperation, they are essentially seeking to do what this person was not able to do, which is to try and discredit someone.”
Politico says that Swalwell “refused” to discuss his relationship with Fang, adding that the controversy would not cost him his seat on the House Intelligence Committee.
“As the story referenced, this goes back to the beginning of the last decade, and it’s something that congressional leadership knew about it,” Swalwell said.
This is an excerpt from The Daily Wire.
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