ChinAI #311: On Alex Wong, an American deputy NSC advisor

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On Alex Wong, an American deputy NSC advisor

Last Thursday, U.S. President Donald Trump ousted his national security advisor Mike Waltz. Reuters reports that Alex Wong, deputy national security advisor, is also “being forced from his post.” After the news broke, Laura Loomer, a right-wing activist who has the ear of Trump — she reportedly met with the president last month to challenge the loyalty of NSC officials — claimed credit for Wong’s departure: “SCALP.”

That one-word X/Twitter post linked to an earlier thread where she had questioned the American-ness of Alex, who was born in New York to Chinese immigrants, and his wife, Candice Wong. Loomer wrote, “Why do we have a CHINESE Deputy National Security advisor who is married to a CHINESE US ATTORNEY who worked under Obama and Biden, and who helped prosecute J6ers after the stolen 2020 election?” The post, which has been viewed 5.7 million times as of May 4th, continues:

And given the Chinese connections, it really makes you wonder if @JeffreyGoldberg , the reporter from the @TheAtlantic was added to the Trump Signal chat on purpose as part of a foreign opp to embarrass the Trump administration on behalf of China.

Many of Loomer’s claims are not worth debunking. Wong has dedicated most of his career to public service. Senator Tom Cotton defended his former foreign policy advisor last week, “Alex Wong and his wife Candice are complete and total patriots, 100% MAGA Warriors who always put America First.” Mike Davis, founder of a legal group closely connected with Trump, spoke up for Candice’s conservative credentials. Senator Andy Kim (D-NJ) also pushed back against Loomer’s attack (see screenshot below).

I do think it’s worth time and space to thoroughly analyze one of Loomer’s charges about Alex’s father-in-law’s supposed links to the Chinese Communist Party, because it illustrates the need for Chinese-language skills and area studies expertise in these discussions. In another thread, Loomer states that AsiaSat — the Hong Kong-domiciled company where Dr. Ya-hui Chiu (Candice Wong’s father) worked for many decades — is “essentially partially owned by the CCP as a state owned entity in China.”

It is true that AsiaSat has some connections to the Chinese government — one of its majority owners is CITIC Group (a state-owned investment company) — but Loomer’s claims leave out a lot of the details. For one, AsiaSat’s other majority owner is an American private equity company. Second, AsiaSat’s satellites are built by U.S. companies; in fact, that’s one of the reasons why Chinese TV broadcasters have pulled their programming from AsiaSat’s satellites.

To point out that China uses Hong Kong-based companies to circumvent export controls, Loomer cites a report on China’s space capabilities by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC), an independent Congressional commissioners with a bipartisan set of commissioners and non-partisan staff. However, if you read that full report (she only includes a screenshot of one page), it even mentions that AsiaSat’s most recent satellites “were launched by SpaceX with support from the U.S. Air Force Space Command’s 45th Space Wing.” Beyond establishing that this particular charge is tenuous at best, this exercise highlights the need for more people who can contribute to USCC reports and critically analyze them.

In other words, we need more Alex Wongs in places like the NSC. For all my disagreements with his policy positions, he has built up a record of expertise and experience that meets the demands of serving as deputy NSC advisor. I met Alex during my testimony before the USCC on China’s diffusion capacity in 2023, when he was vice-chair of the commission. I distinctly remember that he asked the most thoughtful questions from the panel.

Thoughtfulness is the last thing on Loomer’s mind. In her initial thread, the last post features six photos from Alex and Candice Wong’s wedding day. When I look at these photos, I see a couple whose love is in full bloom, surrounded by happy friends and family. In the second image, an American flag seems to almost levitate above the couple.

Here’s how Loomer’s followers see these photos:

• @MuffinAndElliot (14.1k followers): “Two Wongs don’t make a Right!”

• @JAXCHRISTIANxxx: “Tf… Communists”

• @davidclearwat15: “Fucking chinese spies everywhere!”

Perhaps people have avoided tackling this topic because they don’t want to give Loomer a bigger platform (to that I say: is there a bigger platform than direct access to the President of the United States?). And I wish this was just a trend contained to Loomer and her world, but it is not. According to the 2025 STAATUS survey, 40 percent of Americans believe that “Asian Americans are more loyal to their country of origin than to the United States.” That is a substantial increase from 20 percent in 2021. The survey also reports that 27 percent of Americans stated that they were at least somewhat concerned about Chinese Americans as a threat to U.S. society, especially on matters of national security.¹

As a fellow Chinese American with an anglicized first name and Chinese/Cantonese surname, I’ve also wrestled with my Chinese-ness in national security spaces (ChinAI #46). Not that he needs my sympathy or that we have the same story, but I wonder if Wong has ever grappled with similar emotions (my reflections edited to substitute in Wong’s experiences):

You are still searching for what the American dream means to you. Sometimes you wonder if you are confusing it with becoming fully American in the minds of others — to be so excellent (maybe you even become the deputy national security advisor), to be so devoted to public service so that no one can question your claim to this land of the free. You are finding out that you can be trusted to coordinate U.S. national security policy and still face baseless allegations of being a Chinese spy.

And, if I could add just one more thing to set the record straight: You are the first Chinese American to serve as deputy national security advisor, an office that has also been held by the likes of Brent Scowcroft and Colin Powell.

More importantly, you are the 34th American to serve in that role.

Thank you for reading and engaging.

These are Jeff Ding's (sometimes) weekly translations of Chinese-language musings on AI and related topics. Jeff is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at George Washington University.

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1. A Cardozo Law Review study has found that “Chinese and other Asian-Americans are disproportionately charged under the Economic Espionage Act, receive much longer sentences, and are significantly more likely to be innocent than defendants of other races…This Study also suggests that the DOJ is more likely to file charges prematurely, based on weak evidence, when the case involves an Asian-American defendant. Although some of these disparities may reflect legitimate concerns over the risk of flight, they may also reflect implicit biases with regard to the loyalty of Asian-Americans to the United States.”