Suzy George, a new addition to the transition team of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, is a former principal of Albright Stonebridge Group, a consulting firm that has extensive links to the Chinese Communist Party.
George, who joined the transition team in early September, was a principal at the consulting behemoth for over a decade, from 2001 to 2014.
Albright Stonebridge Group (ASG) describes has a robust China practice, declaring it “the firm’s largest single country practice” on its homepage. Among the firm’s ranks, therefore, are several Chinese Communist Party apparatchiks:
“The practice includes trade and policy experts, former high-level U.S. and Chinese government officials and diplomats, executives with significant work experience in China, and dedicated analysts in the field of U.S.-China relations.”
In addition to collaborating with the Chinese Communist Party, ASG has also helped to facilitate the outsourcing of U.S. jobs to China.
On its tab, “Market Assessment and Entry Strategies,” for example, the group boasts of helping “a solar energy company’s consideration of various Chinese provinces as a location for a significant new facility.”
The group also helps American companies comply with the Chinese Communist Party’s business diktats, detailing how ASG assisted a company enter the Chinese market with a caveat: strictly adhering to the Chinese Communist Party’s rules.
Specifically, ASG touts how it helped a U.S. corporate “align” with Chinese “government goals”:
“We then arranged meetings for company executives with key stakeholders in the resort sector to deliver messages demonstrating our client’s commitment to China, and its alignment with government tourism goals.”
In one instance, ASG bragged of it “leveraging” a U.S. Cabinet Secretary visiting China to help advance a business deal:
“We first identified and engaged key Chinese officials and other stakeholders who might be willing to support approval for the acquisition. We then maintained close contact with officials and agencies involved in the government approval process to monitor progress and immediately address challenges as they arose. Our client also leveraged U.S. government advocacy in support of the investment, and the strategy culminated in a visit by a U.S. Cabinet Secretary.”
ASG’s China practice, therefore, necessitates extensive collaboration with Chinese Communist Party officials.
The chairman of ASG China, Jin Ligang, is a Chinese Communist Party member and “former senior Chinese government official” with experience at China’s Ministry of Commerce as Deputy Director General, China’s Washington Embassy as Commercial Counselor, and Lead Commercial Officer at the Chinese Consulate in New York.
ASG Senior Advisor Dai Yunlou’s “distinguished career” entailing “a variety of senior governmental positions within China” is also touted on ASG’s website.
His bio continues:
“From 2000 to 2010, Mr. Dai served as the Minister Counselor for Economic and Commercial Affairs at the Chinese Embassy to the United States. Previously, he served as Deputy Director General of the Department of American and Oceanian Affairs at the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and as the First Secretary of the Economic and Commercial Affairs Office at the Embassy. […] He spent over a decade working at various branches of the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM), including the Department of European Affairs and Third Department of Regional Affairs. He also served as the Division Chief for U.S. Affairs while at MOFCOM. Mr. Dai began his public sector career at the Commercial Office of the Chinese Embassy in Jamaica.”
Another Senior Advisor, Jia Mingru, has “held a number of senior positions in the Chinese government” such as Assistant Minister of Culture and Director General at the State Council Legislative Affairs Office and leader of the Office of the Intellectual Property under the State Council.
Senior Advisor Mu Lan served as Chief Representative in China for the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey, Senior Director Wang Peishu worked as Commercial Counsel at the Chinese Consulate General in Los Angeles, and Vice President George Zhao has worked at Chinese Communist Party-run media outlet CCTV.
And a Director of ASG’s China practice, Harry Hu, is another Chinese Communist Party member who spent nearly a decade working at a “high-profile research institute and think tank affiliated with the Chinese Ministry of Commerce” and served as “Third Secretary at the Chinese Embassy in the Kingdom of Denmark.”
Analyst James Oswald describes himself as having worked “under the Communist Party of China Central Committee,” helping to translate “central government documents and Marxist and Party literature” including “key articles on China’s politics, economy, society, culture, and environment from the CPC’s journal Qiushi, as well as government reports and Xi Jinping’s speeches.”
This unearthed Biden-ASG connection comes on the heels of the Biden campaign pledging to “crack down on the improper influence of lobbyists” and a trove of evidence corroborating claims that the former veep’s son Hunter Biden leveraged his connections to ink lucrative deals with the Chinese Communist Party.
