LOS ANGELES (AP) — The FBI arrested a California real estate agent as she prepared to fly to China, accusing her of secretly working for Beijing to surveil the president of Taiwan's family in the U.S., federal officials said.

The case comes at a fraught moment for U.S.-China relations, with Taiwan persistently at the center of their military and diplomatic rivalry. Beijing claims the island as part of its own territory.

The FBI and federal prosecutors allege Wanying Zhang surveilled the house of the president's son and sent photos, videos and license plate information for his vehicles to a Chinese government official. The federal criminal complaint does not name the alleged target, but the FBI’s rapid response account on the social media platform X said it was the president’s son. Ting-Yu Lai, the president’s elder son, lives and works in the Seattle area as an engineer.

Zhang, a 34-year-old real estate agent from Irvine who also went by the name Heather, was arrested Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport and charged with working for China as an unregistered agent, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said. Zhang is a naturalized U.S. citizen, Shawn Lewis, a spokesperson for the U.S. attorney’s office. said.

It wasn't immediately clear if she had an attorney who could speak on her behalf. She was due to appear Monday afternoon in federal court in Los Angeles.

Her husband, Edric Ding, did not immediately respond to calls and emails seeking comment.

California records show Zhang has been a licensed real estate agent since 2016. A Zillow page shows she has sold seven homes in the last year around Orange County.

Justice Department has been arresting alleged Chinese agents

The case is the latest in a series of Justice Department prosecutions aimed at rooting out alleged covert agents advancing Beijing’s interests on American soil.

Many of the cases have centered on what the Justice Department says is China’s aggressive effort to locate and harass pro-democracy activists living in the U.S. and suppress their speech. The Justice Department also says Beijing is determined to sway American public opinion in its favor by cultivating relationships with political figures seen as having access to the levers of power.

The Chinese Embassy in the U.S. did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday and the Foreign Ministry in Beijing was closed for holidays.

Taiwan’s Presidential Office confirmed President Lai Ching-te’s relatives were the targets, without specifying if it was the president’s son, saying that “this is a classic case of transnational repression.”

“Taiwan condemns in the strongest terms such barbaric acts — which disregard human rights and national sovereignty and aim to suppress, threaten, or even harm individuals advocating for freedom and democracy or their families — as such behavior should not be tolerated in the civilized world,” spokesperson Karen Kuo said in a statement.

Federal officials say surveillance happened in September 2025

At the direction of Chinese officials, Zhang and another person flew to Seattle on Sept. 1, 2025, and conducted surveillance outside the target's home, according to an affidavit. A home security camera near the target's home recorded the pair filming the target and their family from a vehicle, the affidavit said.

Zhang then allegedly sent a Chinese official information related to the surveillance, including photos, videos and license plate information from the target's vehicles. The affidavit said that photos like this and the location of close relatives of a high-ranking Taiwanese official could be useful to China if officials wished to “obtain leverage” over Taiwan's president “during any potential conflict.”

According to an affidavit with the criminal complaint, Zhang attended the University of International Relations in Beijing, which the FBI agent writing the affidavit said is known to be affiliated closely with China’s intelligence apparatus. Many of the university’s graduates go on to work for ministries in Beijing, including the country’s intelligence apparatus.

The affidavit said Zhang and a classmate who became a Chinese government official had kept in contact since graduating around 2014, and he introduced her to another government official, and she was in contact with both in 2025.

Taiwan and China split after a civil war in 1949, but Beijing claims the island as part of its own territory. Lai, who was voted into office in 2024, has said that Taiwan and Beijing do not belong to each other and that the “People's Republic of China has no right to represent Taiwan.”

China considers him a separatist and has called him a “destroyer of peace.”

While in office, Lai has stepped up spending on defense for Taiwan, notably pledging to increase defense spending from 3% to 5% of the GDP, and pushing through a special budget for the construction of a T-Dome air defense system.

In May, a Southern California mayor agreed to plead guilty to acting as an illegal agent for the Chinese government, and resigned from her city position. Eileen Wang, the mayor of Arcadia, had been charged with one count of acting in the U.S. as an illegal agent of a foreign government. She was accused of doing the bidding of Chinese officials, such as sharing articles favorable to Beijing, without prior notification to the U.S. government as required by law.

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Wu contributed to this report from Bangkok and Stengle contributed from Dallas. Reporter Eric Tucker also contributed to this report from Washington.