The Hongcouver | Trudeau’s Liberals were told donor was China graft suspect, but kept taking his money and help

The Liberal Party of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was tipped off in 2013 that a wealthy party benefactor was wanted by China for corruption, long before the news became public, in an email that has been leaked to the South China Morning Post by a former party executive.

The former executive said they were assured at the time that the anonymous email and its startling claims about Vancouver developer Michael Ching Mo Yeung had been “dealt with”. But the party kept quiet and continued to accept donations and support from Ching and a pro-Trudeau political organisation, Tru-Youths United Association, set up in his office.

It would accept thousands of dollars from Ching in 2014 and 2015, while Tru-Youths helped staged massive Liberal fundraisers, including a 1,300-seat event in Toronto in June 2014.

It was not until April 2015 that the SCMP broke the news that Ching was in fact Cheng Muyang, the wanted son of corrupt Chinese communist party official Cheng Weigao.

Yet on December 15, 2013, the executive was among a group of Liberals who received a 1,500-word email from an anonymous tipster, identifying themselves only as “Snow White”. Ching’s teenage daughter, Linda, had just been elected unopposed as president of the Young Liberals in British Columbia, to the apparent concern of the emailer.