Declassified FBI documents reveal the bureau discovered Eric Swalwell’s affair with suspected Chinese spy Christine Fang by accident while attempting to recruit her as a double-agent.
The California Democrat, 45, who is currently running for governor, was codenamed in bureau files alongside Fang, who carried the cryptonym “Rusty Thumbs.” According to a 2013 FBI memo released Monday by the White House Government Transparency Task Force, Swalwell joked about Fang’s suspected ties to China’s Ministry of State Security during their relationship. “Congressman Eric SWALWELL… Commented that [Fang] was suspected as associated with the ‘Chinese CIA’ [MSS], albeit in a joking manner,” the memo stated. “[Fang] further joked that all [Ministry of State Security] MSS officers were either old men or ladies, therefore, she could not be MSS.”
Fang herself offered a telling remark to the undercover agent. “[Fang] remarked that the MSS would have hired prostitutes instead of using an MSS officer directly to entice the officials,” the memo noted. The same document recorded Fang boasting she could “use her sexuality on politicians” because she was “young and pretty,” and that she had passed up a chance to “marry rich in Beijing” to forge her own path.
The FBI recruitment effort took place in 2013, when an undercover agent approached Fang through a bureau cutout company. Agents knew her parents were Chinese intelligence officers and believed her “motivations appear to be centered on money and power.” They also assessed that she exhibited “certain egotistical/narcissistic traits which may impact her suitability as a source.” By March 2014, the bureau concluded she could not be trusted and closed the file. Six days later, the FBI opened its investigation into Swalwell over Fang’s access to him.
Two years after the failed recruitment, in 2015, Swalwell was forced to confess the physical nature of the relationship. The declassified documents state he admitted to “physical relations with Fang on a handful of occasions.” At the time, Swalwell was seeing her roughly every two months and serving on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, a position that made the relationship particularly alarming to counterintelligence officials. The FBI gave him a classified defensive briefing on April 30, 2015.
The documents were marked declassified this March but only became public Monday. Swalwell, who was then leading the Democratic primary field for California governor, threatened to sue FBI Director Kash Patel to block their release. His attorneys, Sean Hecker and Norm Eisen, fired off a cease-and-desist letter arguing the move was politically motivated. “[Y]our attempt to release the file is a transparent attempt to smear him and undermine his campaign for Governor of California,” they wrote to Patel. “Your actions threaten to expose you, others at the FBI, and the FBI itself to significant legal liability.” An FBI spokesperson pushed back, stating the bureau prepares documents “for numerous different reasons, including for release to different agencies and departments to further review investigations that may have been opened under previous administrations.”
Swalwell has publicly dismissed the entire matter. “As was Trump’s mortgage case against me, this decade-old story is, of course, nonsense,” he said in a statement to KRON4.com. He accused the Trump administration of trying to “stop him” because he had become the favorite in the governor’s race. “What Trump wants the most is to have a Western White House. An enabler on the opposite coast,” he added.
In the viral moment that first brought this scandal to national attention, reports said in December 2020 that Fang had targeted multiple Bay Area Democrats as part of a suspected Chinese intelligence operation running from 2011 to 2015. She had bundled donations for Swalwell’s 2014 reelection campaign and placed at least one intern in his office. Swalwell immediately cut ties after the 2015 FBI briefing, and the Justice Department never pursued criminal charges against him. The House Ethics Committee closed its own probe in May 2023 without finding any violations, though it cautioned members about foreign influence attempts. GOP leadership briefly removed him from the Intelligence Committee, but Democrats later restored him to the panel. He resigned from the House in April amid separate sexual misconduct and rape accusations, which he has vehemently denied and claimed were politically motivated.
Swalwell’s Democratic rival in the governor’s race, Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, blasted Patel for pushing the file release. “What the hell does that have to do with law enforcement?” Raskin said Saturday. “This is plain weaponization of the FBI for partisan political purposes.”
Early voting for California’s June 2 gubernatorial primary begins in early May.