Newly declassified FBI records this week shed new light on just how close a suspected Chinese spy got to former California Representative Eric Swalwell as well as the quiet campaign of political influence Beijing is waging across the United States. Swalwell told FBI agents during a 2015 interview that he had had "physical relations" with Christine Fang, also known as Fang Fang, more than once in the years she was campaigning on his behalf as an unpaid volunteer, according to documents released by the White House Government Transparency Task Force. Senior intelligence officials across U.S. administrations have described China’s intelligence activities as sophisticated and diverse—ranging from balloons to malware—but Fang’s case shows that sex, money and power remain the central tools of spycraft.
Although the FBI found no evidence that Fang had extracted classified information from Swalwell or others like him before she fled to China, the U.S. intelligence community has identified a troubling pattern of attempted influence at the grassroots level of American politics, for a potential payoff years or even decades down the line. Fang enrolled as a student at a Bay Area university in 2011 and became involved in local politics through Asian American civic groups like the ones raising funds for California’s rising stars, including then-councilman Swalwell. Before she became the subject of the counterintelligence operation known as "Freshman Fifteen," she was targeted for recruitment by the FBI under the code name "Rusty Thumbs," according to the latest disclosures.
U.S. authorities suspected she was the child of intelligence officers for China’s State Security Ministry and believed she could be a suitable double agent, until they believed she was violating U.S. election law on behalf of the Chinese government by orchestrating illegal straw donations from otherwise-ineligible persons. Swalwell, who was elected to Congress in 2013, was cleared of all suspicion, first by the FBI and later by the House Ethics Committee. The U.S. congressman said he cut contact with Fang after investigators briefed him on her foreign influence tactics, but the case hung over him for years after it was first revealed in 2020.
This past April, Swalwell ended his campaign for governor of California and resigned from Congress over allegations of sexual misconduct, which he denies. A special election on June 16 to fill the vacant seat for California's 14th congressional district didn't produce a majority winner. The runoff will be held on August 18.
Swalwell was 30 years old when he launched his congressional campaign. Beijing targeted him and other rising figures as part of a campaign of subnational influence, with the aim of one day securing friends or assets high up in U.S. politics or government. The Chinese intelligence apparatus has been known to cast a wide net, across party lines, and likely has a running assessment of which U.S. political figures might be most sympathetic to China’s cause.
Western governments with a separation of powers are most vulnerable to China’s strategy of influence from the bottom up, experts say. The activity differs from lobbying in that it is unregistered and deliberately opaque. Most of Beijing’s targets in the U.S. may never win a local, state or federal election, but even a low return may be worth the investment—and it would only represent one avenue of state espionage.
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