Feds say Cuomo-Hochul aide and accused Chinese agent ‘betrayed’ New York

BROOKLYN (CN) — Nearly a month ago, federal prosecutors proclaimed to a fresh group of Brooklyn jurors that Linda Sun’s loyalty was “for sale.”

“Now that you’ve seen and heard the evidence, you know that’s true,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Alexander Solomon said Tuesday, following a more than three-week bribery trial against Sun — a former high-ranking aide for New York Governors Andrew Cuomo and Kathy Hochul.

Solomon handled the lengthy closing argument on behalf of the government, which charged Sun with being at the center of a sprawling Chinese influence scheme that he said “betrayed the state of New York.” Prosecutors say the longtime public servant did favors for Beijing in exchange for bribes and benefits, selling out New Yorkers to fund gaudy sports cars, multimillion-dollar homes and lavish duck dinners.

“Linda Sun was all about the money,” Solomon said at closings, directing jurors to a photograph of Sun’s iPhone case that said, “Get Rich. Good Luck.”

Solomon argued that Sun spun a “complex web of lies and secrecy” to benefit herself by serving the Chinese while simultaneously hiding that allegiance from her bosses in state government. He explained the supposed lengths to which Sun went to keep Taiwan away from the government’s office, a move that was applauded by her allies in the Chinese government who opposed Taiwanese independence.

In one instance, Solomon described Sun alerting the Chinese consulate that Cuomo had been invited to meet with the Taiwanese president.

“Just an FYI. I already blocked it,” Sun said in a test message to a consulate official.

Despite lacking the power to block invitations on her own, the government claims Sun didn’t so much as forward the invitation to the proper channel of the executive chamber before shooting it down.

For prosecutors, this was one of many examples of Sun boasting about her corruption to her handlers. Last week, jurors saw Sun call then-Lieutenant Governor Hochul “obedient” in a text message after she successfully got her to make a Lunar New Year video for the Chinese consulate.

“She worked for the Chinese government, not the people of New York state,” Solomon said of Sun.

According to Solomon, Sun “wasn’t shy” about asking for gifts in return. He pointed to another text from Sun, this time to the then-head of the Chinese consulate Huang Ping, which read, “I want to eat salted duck.”

Nanjing-style salted duck, prepared by Ping’s personal chef, was purportedly one of the ways Sun was compensated for her favors.

“Sometimes, she wanted enough duck to feed her family for Thanksgiving dinner,” Solomon said, seemingly a reference to other texts shown throughout the trial in which Sun discussed receiving ducks for her family.

Sun is also accused of covertly adding a Chinese consulate official to a state government call discussing New York’s Covid-19 pandemic response. She’s charged, too, with fudging Hochul’s signature on invitation letters to Chinese officials, who then used those letters to apply for visas to the United States.

“She forged Kathy Hochul’s signature time after time after time,” Solomon said.

If convicted, Sun could face serious prison time. A 19-count indictment against her — and her husband Chris Hu — includes charges like conspiracy to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act, visa fraud, bank fraud and money laundering.

Hu is accused of keeping his struggling seafood company afloat with Sun’s favors for Beijing. Prosecutors say the couple took a trip to China to secure a sweetheart deal to help Hu’s lobster-exporting business become more profitable.

Once it was, prosecutors say Sun and Hu cashed out on a 2024 Ferrari Roma and designer accessories.

The duo is also charged with directing valuable Covid-19 contracts to Chinese vendors with family ties, purportedly steering millions to their preferred mask and ventilator companies in exchange for millions in kickbacks.

Prosecutors say Hu, when laundering those kickbacks, referred to the illegal cash in messages as “apples” to cover his tracks.

The defense attorneys will deliver their closing statements on Wednesday. At the trial’s opening last month, they attributed Sun’s habit of receiving gifts to Chinese customs and culture. Her lawyer Jarrod Schaeffer told jurors at the time that gifts are “a common cultural and political practice” in China and that the government there did the same for other officials.

Of the Covid-19 contract accusations, Schaeffer claimed his client did her job and successfully delivered the personal protective equipment the state so desperately needed.

“She was working around the clock for fellow New Yorkers,” Schaeffer said on Nov. 12. “She helped New Yorkers locate millions of dollars of PPE.”The jury is expected to start deliberating by the end of this week. Presiding over the trial is Senior U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan, a George W. Bush appointee who previously oversaw the case of Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.

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