Overview
- Yaoning “Mike” Sun, 65, was sentenced to 48 months in Los Angeles federal court after pleading guilty in October 2025 to acting as an illegal foreign agent.
- Court filings say that from 2022 to January 2024 he worked at the direction of PRC officials, including while serving as a campaign advisor to a candidate who won a local council seat in November 2022.
- Prosecutors say Sun and “Individual 1” ran a Chinese-language website that published pro-PRC content at official request, and he later sought $80,000 to fund a pro-PRC demonstration in Washington, D.C.
- During then–Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen’s April 2023 visit to Southern California, Sun sent real-time movement updates and photos of protesters to a PRC consular official.
- The candidate is identified in news reports as Arcadia politician Eileen Wang, who has not been charged, and Sun’s co-conspirator John Chen was previously sentenced to 20 months for acting as an illegal PRC agent.