California Mayor’s Campaign Manager was a Chinese Spy

How deep is Communist China into our politics? In California, really deep.

A Southern California mayor refused to comment on her former fiancé and campaign staffer, who was sentenced to four years in federal prison for “acting as an illegal agent of the People’s Republic of China.”

Last week, Arcadia Mayor Eileen Wang’s former fiancé, Yaoning “Mike” Sun, was sentenced to four years in federal prison for acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government.

Wang commented on her relationship with Sun during a council meeting in December 2022.

“To my fiancé, Mike Sun, who walked streets with me every single day, who is a real leader of me,” Wang said.

After Sun was charged, Wang tried to distance herself from him.

“No. 1, he’s not my fiancé,” Wang said in September 2025. “Whoever wants to say he’s my former fiancé, please prove it.”

Or the “real leader of me”.

The DOJ release appears to raise serious questions about China’s aim here.

At the direction and control of PRC government officials, Sun coordinated with U.S.-based individuals to promote the PRC’s interests by, among other things, “orchestrat[ing]” a team to help elect a politician identified in court documents as “Individual 1” to political office and promoting pro-PRC propaganda in the United States.

In December 2022, Sun attended a meeting in Southern California with a group of other people, including Individual 1, whom PRC officials were told was a “team dedicated” to PRC interests, according to Sun’s plea agreement.

In February 2023, Sun drafted a report for PRC officials to solicit additional money and taskings from the PRC government. Sun’s report summarized his personal experience, including his past service in the People’s Liberation Army, China’s military. In the report, Sun stated that he had worked in the United States to lead “delegations of U.S. dignitaries and cultural workers to China,” “persist in resisting any hostile forces that undermine the friendship of U.S.-China relations, and Chinese secessionist forces,” and, “most of all, during the 2022 U.S. midterm elections, I orchestrated and organized my team to win the election for city council” for Individual 1, whom Sun called a “new political star,” Sun’s plea agreement states.

What did ‘Individual 1’ know and when did they know it? And how many others are in networks like this? How many American elected officials actually work for China?