Donald Trump, Mr. “Tough” on China, was so soft that President Biden had to order an increase in vigilance against Chinese spy efforts.
Hours after we learned that Trump administration officials knew about the spy balloon but Trump and many of his top deputies did not, we are now told that the only reason we know about those Trump balloons is because President Biden ordered the intelligence community “to increase both our vigilance and the assets that we were deploying to be able to detect Chinese efforts to spy against the United States.”
“White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan also said on Monday that past surveillance balloons were discovered at the beginning of the Biden administration because Biden directed the intelligence community “to increase both our vigilance and the assets that we were deploying to be able to detect Chinese efforts to spy against the United States,” CNN reported.
“Because the intelligence community made this a priority at the direction of President Biden, we enhanced our surveillance of our territorial airspace, we enhanced our capacity to be able to detect things that the Trump administration was unable to detect,” Sullivan said.
“And were also able to go back and look at the historical patterns. And that led us to come to understand that during the Trump administration, as you said, there were multiple instances where the surveillance balloons traversed American airspace and American territory,” he added.
This should be the part where we ask why President Biden knew he needed to increase vigilance of Chinese spy activity after Trump’s four year term, especially in light of the fact that Donald Trump had a secret Chinese bank account during his presidency.
During a 2020 presidential debate, Trump said the Chinese account “was closed in 2015, I believe” and claimed “I closed it before I even ran for president, let alone became president.”
It begs the question, what business was Trump doing in China while president?
Rep. Daniel Goldman (D-NY) wrote on Twitter, “Trump had bank accounts in China while he was in office until 2018. Generally, you only have bank accounts in a foreign country if you are doing transactions in that country’s currency. What business was Trump doing in China while he was president?”
Trump had bank accounts in China while he was in office until 2018.
Generally, you only have bank accounts in a foreign country if you are doing transactions in that country’s currency.
What business was Trump doing in China while he was President? https://t.co/SQhyPEOOxi
— Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman) December 30, 2022
Add it all up, include a huge classified document theft with side order of willfully non-secure storage and refusal to return the documents when asked and when subpoenaed. Now add in a secret Chinese bank account and the business ramifications of that. And finally, an administration that at the very best didn’t prioritize the discovery of Chinese spy balloons.
There’s a big piece of this story missing, and that is: What was Trump doing in China while president.
This whole Chinese spy balloon “scandal” keeps blowing up in Republicans’ faces, which was predictable because they criticize before asking any questions these days.
But now they not only have egg on their faces, but they look nakedly anti-American national security. They only care about any issue if it can be used as a club in an attempt to hurt President Biden.
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Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
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