- The Epoch Times’ chief financial officer, Weidong Bill Guan, was indicted on charges of misappropriating $67 million in criminal proceeds to the media outlet, its affiliates and himself.
- Guan pleaded not guilty but was suspended from the media company.
- Founded in 2000, The Epoch Times is a newspaper published in 23 languages.
The arrest this week of a senior Epoch Times executive on money laundering charges has put the spotlight on a little-known publication since it was founded in 2000 and its transformation under the Trump administration.
Federal prosecutors in New York charged Weidon “Bill” Guan of Secaucus, New Jersey, chief financial officer of The Epoch Times, with funneling at least $67 million in criminal proceeds, much of it fraudulently obtained unemployment insurance benefits, to the company, its affiliates, and himself. Guan has pleaded not guilty but has been suspended by The Epoch Times, which agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.
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The incident has raised doubts about the future of the company, which has been a key online supporter of President Trump and spread conspiracy theories.
What are Epoch Times?
What started as a newspaper, the company produces news websites and videos that are now available in 23 languages. Its founder, John Tan, is a Chinese-American who practices Falun Gong, a form of meditation and exercise whose followers the Chinese government has denounced, banned and, according to its members, consistently oppressed and abused.
Plastic newspaper racks for The Epoch Times, The Village Voice and other papers line a sidewalk in Manhattan in New York on Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2013. The arrest this week of an Epoch Times executive in a money laundering scheme has focused attention on a media outlet that has remained largely in the shadows between its founding in 2000 and transformation under the Trump administration. (AP Photo/Mark Lenihan)
While the media seeks to distance itself from the Falun Gong movement itself, it states that it “regards the Chinese Communist Party’s persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, and their incredibly heroic response to it, as one of the most underreported events of the past 20 years.”
The paper is by no means a single-issue news outlet — the lead story on its website Wednesday was about the previous night’s U.S. primary elections — but the Epoch Times frequently reports harshly on the Chinese government. Articles published on its website Wednesday included an opinion piece on the origins of the new coronavirus and a look back at the Tiananmen Square massacre on its 35th anniversary. The paper also heavily promotes books by Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Gong.
“Our goal is not to impose our views on readers, but to provide them with the information they need to make their own judgments,” the Epoch Times said.
How did the era change?
The Epoch Times website currently features testimony from senior Trump administration officials Peter Navarro and Sebastian Gorka, as well as Republican Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona.
That’s a clue. The news organization transformed itself during the Trump administration into a site supporting the former president and his causes. It was opportunistic in two ways: Its leaders saw Trump as a president who would take on the Chinese government, and they saw an opportunity to raise money from people who believed in that cause, says AJ Bauer, a professor at the University of Alabama who studies conservative media.
Within a few years, the media had become a partisan force, “and spawned a global misinformation machine that repeatedly thrusts far-fetched claims into the mainstream,” The New York Times reported in 2020.
The paper has covered a wide range of conspiracy theories, many of them related to the coronavirus. The Epoch Times and its affiliates have spread false stories about the Obama administration spying on Trump’s 2016 campaign, as well as theories promoted by QAnon conspiracy sites and claims about voter fraud.
The Epoch Times was particularly active on Facebook through advertising and the creation of various pages that directed social media users to its content. Following an investigation by NBC News, the social media giant banned pro-Trump ads produced by the publication in 2019 for violating its advertising policies.
The indictment doesn’t specifically say that these pro-Trump efforts were funded through the alleged criminal scheme. But that’s when the money started pouring in: The Epoch Times reported revenue of about $128 million in 2021, a staggering increase from $4 million in 2016, according to federal financial disclosures. The turnaround caught the eye of banks, regulators and, eventually, federal prosecutors.
According to the federal indictment, much of the money flowed through the company’s “Make Money Online” team, which Guan ran. Guan claims the large amount of money came in part from increased membership and donations, according to the indictment.
What does this mean for the future of The Epoch Times?
Prosecutors have only charged Guan, but the indictment said “other individuals, known and unknown,” knew what was going on, raising questions about whether anyone else at the company might be implicated and how this might affect The Epoch Times’ future. The company did not immediately respond to inquiries about the case.
Given the actions Facebook took against the company in 2019, it’s questionable whether the strategies used previously will apply to campaigns in 2024. Facebook’s downplaying of news and political content certainly closes off some avenues to reach people, Bauer said.
Conservatives certainly recognize that The Epoch Times is committed to their causes, yet the paper’s influence is surprisingly small, said Howard Polskin, who monitors conservative media for The Lightning Website.
“They don’t seem to be driving the news agenda for the right-wing media,” Polskin said. “I don’t think the right-wing media is paying much attention to what they’re doing.”
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Bauer agreed. The Epoch Times’ influence seems to be largely limited to those whose primary goal is to oppose the Chinese government, he said.
“They, like other media, are struggling to find an audience right now,” Bauer said. “I don’t think many people are going to turn on the Epoch Times while they’re having their morning coffee and listen to what they have to say.”
