Mar-a-Lago Chinese espionage suspect Zhang Yujing pleaded not guilty to charges that she lied to a federal agent and entered restricted property without permission.
A passport photo of Zhang Yujing, who remains in custody in Florida.
Judge denies bail to Zhang over ‘extreme’ flight risk. And the FBI is treating her case as a national-security matter.
China’s mouthpiece Global Times immediately published an article insisting Yujing Zhang is neither a High Tech Spy nor is she a High Class Hooker. It’s said Zhang is nothing more than a ‘naive victim of a cross-border scam’ perpetuated by ‘a fraudster friend of Donald Trump’ called Charles Lee.
Charles Lee with US President Donald Trump… Say Cheeeze!
Global Times reiterated Zhang had “no idea” what she was getting herself into when she pursued a Chinese Friendship Association event advertised by its chief, Charles Lee, and his business associate, Cindy Yang, supposedly Trump’s ‘Access Agent’ who used to run sex spas and allegedly pimped prostitutes to celebrity clients like #NewEnglandPatroits owner Robert Kraft.
Again, Say Cheeeze! Cindy Yang snaps a selfie with US President Donald Trump at a Super Bowl watching party held at the president’s West Palm Beach country club on February 3.
While Zhang’s true reason for attempting entry into the resort remains unclear, Zhang told the court she owns US$1.3 million home and BMW, and that she works for Shanghai Zhirong Asset Management, a private-equity business.
However, FBI doesn’t buy the story and the Magistrate commented: “Yujing Zhang up to something nefarious at Mar-a-Lago“.
Zhang is currently under intensive investigation if she was working as a Chinese intelligence operative. Since late last year, an FBI counterintelligence squad has been investigating possible Chinese espionage operations in South Florida targeting President Trump,
What is certain for now is that Charles Lee had advertised an event at Mar-a-Lago for that day, featuring a guest appearance by Elizabeth Trump Grau, the president’s sister. But it had been cancelled after its promoter Cindy Yang – the Florida massage parlor operator who peddled access to senior Trump administration officials for Chinese clients – came under scrutiny.
ACCESS FOR SALE AT MAR-A-LAGO
Source: Miami Herald
According to Global Times, Charles Lee is a “criminal who uses shell companies in the US to scam in China.”
Zhang reportedly paid Lee 135,000 yuan ($20,120) for the trip and the access to Mar-a-Lago, but “After the event was cancelled, [Lee] did not refund [the money] to Zhang, and was nowhere to be found,” the Global Times noted.
Lee advertised access to political figures around the world to Chinese clients and had used at least four names to do business.
“After the event was cancelled, [Lee] did not refund [money] to Zhang, and was nowhere to be found,” Global Times said.
“Zhang, who came from thousands of miles away, is now doomed in such a frightening situation in the US: not only has she lost her money, she has become a victim from the crazy ‘witch-hunt’ from US government and media targeting China.”
Whoops.
So, WTF is Charles Lee?
Businessman linked to woman who breached Mar-a-Lago security has a chequered, mysterious past
- Lee, who has used multiple identities and faced accusations of business fraud, advertised an event that Zhang Yujing said she was at Trump’s resort to attend
- US Securities and Exchange Commission filings show that Lee had a business partnership with a Chinese lawmaker
Equally puzzling and potentially troubling is the man who advertised the event that Zhang claimed she was at Mar-a-Largo to attend:-
Charles Lee – multiple identities, a professional partnership with a Chinese lawmaker, allegations of business fraud and a host of dormant companies based in the US tax haven of Delaware.
In 2011, under the name Li Weitian, which is believed to be his legal name, Lee registered the United Nations Chinese Friendship Association (UNCFA) in Delaware, a state that attracts corporations from across the US and the world – some legitimate, some suspect – because of its business-friendly tax laws.
It was a “United Nations Friendship Event” that Zhang told staff at Mar-a-Lago she was there to attend on March 30, at the invitation of a Chinese man called “Charles”, according to a criminal complaint.
A receipt presented by her lawyer to a Palm Beach, Florida, court on Monday showed that Zhang had paid a fee of about US$20,000 on February 19 to a Beijing company. The purpose of that transfer, he said, was to pay for attendance to the Mar-a-Lago event, which had been cancelled before Zhang’s arrival.
Yang has denied knowing Lee, though they have been pictured together at two social events.
Despite claims on the UNCFA’s now defunct website, Lee’s association is not affiliated with the United Nations. Lee also lists himself as CEO of numerous other corporations whose names appropriate the UN, including the United Nations Fund for Peace and Development, a close echo of the international body’s legitimate United Nations Peace and Development Trust Fund.
“Unfortunately many organisations around the world wrongfully claim an affiliation with the UN and then try to exploit it commercially,” said UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric, who confirmed that the UN’s legal team was looking into Lee’s use of the United Nations name in his corporations.
A photo on Lee’s website and business cards showing him shaking hands with former UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon “in no way [implies] any type of endorsement or support on the part of the secretary general for Mr Lee’s organisation”, said Dujarric, who recalled being at the event – a UN correspondents dinner several years ago – at which the picture was taken.
Scrutiny of Lee’s business ventures by US media and lawmakers has focused not on possible trademark infringement but on potential national security threats posed by his apparent connections to the Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Work Department, a link illustrated by a photo on the UNCFA’s website of Lee with the agency’s former deputy director You Lantian.
Lee (left) pictured in a 2007 investigative report and identified as Li Chongrui, and (right) in a more recent photograph from his defunct website with Elizabeth Trump Grau, sister of the US president.
Lee’s association had “troubling connections to the Chinese government”, Representative Adam Schiff, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a letter last week to US national security heads in which he called for the FBI to assess whether Zhang had attempted to infiltrate Mar-a-Lago at the behest of the Chinese government or the Communist Party.
Among other things, the different names Lee had used to sign the agreements – first Li Ruizhou and later Li Weitian. Lee’s company said Li Ruizhou was Li Weitian’s former name, and insisted it did nothing wrong.
A court document also revealed that Lee’s business partner at the time was Ming Xu, founder and chairman of the California-based investment firm World Capital Market Inc.
The US government in 2014 shut down the company and another in Hong Kong controlled by Xu after the SEC accused them of operating “a worldwide pyramid scheme” that falsely promised fast gains to tens of thousands of Asian-American, Hispanic and foreign investors in a cloud services venture. Xu was arrested by Chinese police in 2015 for suspected illegal business operations.
Long before the court case, Lee, under different names, had been the focus of two investigative reports – in 2004 and 2007 – by Southern Weekly, a respected Chinese publication known for its hard-hitting reporting before Beijing further tightened its grip on press freedom.
Calling himself Wang Yong Jun, Lee ran the Beijing office of the American World Bank United Investment Group, which promoted itself as a “collaborating partner” of the World Bank, a claim denied by the World Bank, according to Southern Weekly’s 2004 report.
The company appeared to be a replacement for the American International Wealth Coalition Invest Group, which Lee incorporated in California in 2001. It had been suspended for failing to meet tax requirements, state records show.
This Charles Lee character sure sounds like ponzi pothead Bernie Madoff,
Mar-a-Lago Mimosas?
Melania Trump (born Melanija Knavs; [mɛˈlaːnija ˈknaːu̯s], Germanized to Melania Knauss; April 26, 1970) is the current First Lady of the United States and third wife of the 45th President of the United States, Donald Trump.