Eric Swalwell spent three years calling Donald Trump a Russian asset on national television.
This week, the files he sent lawyers to suppress finally dropped.
What he admitted to federal agents – in his own words, under questioning – is something no Democrat in Washington wants you to read.
Declassified FBI Files Show Swalwell Admitted Sex With Christine Fang
President Trump declassified the FBI's investigative files on Eric Swalwell, and the White House Government Transparency Task Force published them – a decade of bureau memos Swalwell's own lawyers had threatened to sue to keep hidden.
The files put Swalwell in an FBI interrogation room in Oakland in 2015, answering questions about Christine Fang – a Chinese national known to investigators as "Fang Fang" – and what exactly happened between them.
Swalwell told agents Fang showed up uninvited at his apartment late one night and banged on his door.
He let her in, and the two "hooked up."
Swalwell told agents he barely remembered the encounter — he had taken an Ambien before she arrived.
The bureau opened a formal investigation into Swalwell's ties to Fang in 2014.
Agents examined illegal campaign donations routed through American conduits to disguise Fang as the source, along with a scheme in which access to Swalwell's congressional office – including intern placements – was allegedly exchanged for campaign cash.
The FBI's stated objective at one stage was to gather enough evidence to indict both Swalwell and Fang for campaign finance violations and bribery.
Swalwell told agents his fundraising operation was too weak to detect the straw donations Fang funneled through U.S. citizens.
The Man on the House Intelligence Committee Was Sleeping With a Chinese Spy
Swalwell was not some backbench nobody when Fang walked through his door.
By 2015, he held a seat on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence – the body that receives the most sensitive national security briefings in the United States government.
That is the same year Fang left the country as the FBI's investigation into her activities reached an advanced stage.
The early stages of that investigation were overseen in part by Jack Smith – the same prosecutor who later brought criminal charges against Donald Trump.
Smith's office declined to charge her. She returned to China in mid-2015 and was never prosecuted.
Swalwell kept his Intelligence Committee seat until 2023, when House Speaker Kevin McCarthy finally removed him.
For the years in between, Swalwell appeared on television virtually every night warning Americans about foreign interference in their democracy – while the FBI sat on files documenting his own admitted relationship with a Chinese intelligence operative.
How China's Honeypot Operation Targeted Democrat Politicians for Decades
Fox News reported that intelligence experts described Beijing's honeypot network as a deliberate strategy – sexual access, illegal money, and planted staffers – aimed specifically at rising American politicians before they reach positions of real power.
FBI records show Fang's parents were agents of China's Ministry of State Security.
She targeted at least two sitting mayors in addition to Swalwell, using the same methods.
The bureau was also attempting to recruit Fang as a confidential informant, building a cover through a cutout company, when agents uncovered the full scope of her criminal activity.
She was out of the country before the recruitment could be completed or the case prosecuted.
He Sent Lawyers to Stop This. It Came Out Anyway.
Swalwell knew these files existed.
In March 2026, while running as the Democrat frontrunner for California governor, his attorneys sent FBI Director Kash Patel a cease-and-desist letter giving the bureau three days to commit in writing that the documents would not be released – with litigation threatened if they refused.
His lawyers called the planned release "a transparent attempt to smear him and undermine his campaign."
Former Attorney General Pam Bondi initially declined to release the files.
Swalwell suspended his gubernatorial bid on April 12 amid sexual misconduct allegations from multiple women and resigned from Congress two days later.
The files came out anyway.
Swalwell's attorney called the release "nothing new" and insisted the documents confirm he "did nothing wrong."
A member of the House Intelligence Committee admitted to sleeping with a woman the FBI suspected of working for Chinese intelligence, whose network placed interns in his congressional office while illegal foreign money moved through his campaign.
The man who spent years demanding Trump answer for Russia just got exposed by his own FBI file.
Sources:
- Annie Gaus and Josh Koehn, "Eric Swalwell confessed to drug-fueled sex romp with suspected Chinese spy 'Fang Fang,' bombshell files reveal," New York Post, August 17, 2026.
- Mary Chastain, "FBI Files: Swalwell Had Relationship With Suspected Chinese Spy," Legal Insurrection, August 17, 2026.
- Rusty Weiss, "Shocking FBI Files Reveal New Details of Swalwell's Intimate Relationship With Infamous Chinese Spy," RedState, August 17, 2026.
- "Released FBI Files Detail Swalwell-Fang Fang Ties," Newsmax, August 17, 2026.
- "Patel Prepping Release of Files on Eric Swalwell's Ties to Alleged Spy," Washington Examiner, March 29, 2026.
- "China's Extensive 'Honey Trap' Spy Network Could Involve Thousands of Ploys Underway Now, Ex-Operative Says," Fox News, December 10, 2020.
