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Opinion | The Cindy Yang scandal: when Chinese businessmen buy tickets to Trump events, what are they buying?
- Based on my own experience, I know there is a strong demand for a Trump connection from Chinese businessmen and individuals. What they are after is not influence over US politics, but a chance to impress people back home
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Why you can trust SCMP
Reports on Cindy Yang, the founder of a recently raided Florida massage parlour that allegedly offered sexual services, have turned the spotlight on social media pictures of her with US President Donald Trump and his family members. Yang, who emigrated from China to the US, reportedly set up a company in 2017 to sell Chinese clients access to the US president and prominent Republican politicians.
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Could Yang be another Maria Butina (a Russian woman charged in a US court with trying to influence US policy on Russia)?
While the connection between Yang’s business activities and political contributions in the US is definitely worth investigating, we must refrain from characterising the case as an instance of China exerting its back-door political influence, unless new evidence becomes available.
Undoubtedly, actual or perceived political influence in the US is highly bankable in China. I don’t know enough about Yang’s business dealings to judge whether any of her endeavours were related to the interests of the Chinese government.
Based on my own experience, I know there is a market demand for a Trump connection from Chinese businessmen and other private citizens whose vanity outweighs their political agenda. This is no Chinagate.
Since Trump was elected, I have received more than my fair share of proposals from Chinese friends and strangers seeking access to Trump, because his son-in-law Jared Kushner was my former business partner. The wildest proposal was from a Chinese company offering to build the border wall between the US and Mexico gratis!
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