Chinese billionaire, Trump club member brings lots of questions

MIAMI – A high-profile Chinese fugitive – who belongs to President Donald Trump’s exclusive South Florida club, Mara-lago, and has railed against China’s communist government – is accused of being a spy for that very regime, according to new documents filed in a federal court case in New York.

Chinese billionaire Guo Wengui, who also goes by Miles Kwok, fled to the United States four years ago after learning an associate had been arrested on corruption charges. He is now one of China’s most-wanted, accused of myriad crimes by the Chinese government, including paying bribes and sexual assault. He maintains his innocence, saying the charges are politically motivated.

Guo, who made his money in real estate, has long promoted himself as a dissident being hunted by the Chinese government for his opposition to the ruling Chinese Communist Party. He is currently seeking political asylum in the United States, where he reportedly avoided deportation by the Trump administration after the president learned Guo was a member of Mar-a-lago.

Now, filings in a civil case, first reported by the Wall Street Journal, suggest Guo may not be the dissident he claims. “Instead, Guo Wengui was, and is, a dissident-hunter, propagandist, and agent in the service of the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese Communist Party,” according to federal court papers filed on Friday.

The Chinese spy allegations against Guo surfaced last week in a contract dispute – rife with international and political intrigue – between a Hong Kong-based company, Eastern Profit Corporation Limited, and an Arlington, Va., research firm, Strategic Vision US, LLC.

Guo denied the allegations through his attorney, saying the claim “utterly lacks credibility.”

“This lawsuit is about a contract between Eastern Profit and Strategic. Strategic is now abusing the litigation privilege to slander Mr. Guo,” wrote Guo’s attorney, Daniel Podhaskie, in a response to the Miami Herald. He claimed the slander was retaliation after Strategic’s counterclaim was dismissed. Podhaskie pointed to Guo’s frozen assets in China as proof that he is not working with the Communist Party.

In the lawsuit, Eastern Profit says it hired Strategic Vision last year to investigate 15 unnamed individuals after holding several meetings at Guo’s ritzy apartment at the Sherry-netherland Hotel in Manhattan. The research firm said it had considerable experience in the field, citing probes of the personal lives of Republican politicians, a Middle Eastern prince, and a Russian official in the opposition party.

But Eastern claims that Strategic Vision failed to deliver the private information on the 15 Chinese nationals operating in the United States after being paid an initial $1 million for the promised “high-quality original research,” according to the federal suit filed last year in the Southern District of New York.

Strategic Vision, headed by CEO French Wallop, the widow of the late Wyoming GOP Sen. Malcolm Wallop, was fired by Eastern Profit in February 2018 after the research firm provided information that was mostly publicly available on the probe’s targets, the suit says. Eastern Profit demanded the return of its $1 million deposit for the research work, accusing Strategic Vision of breaching their contract.