Sex, secrets and spies: The history of suspected honey traps
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Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang during a Bloomberg Television interview in London. Photo: Jose Sarmento Matos/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's affair with a woman suspected of spying for China echoes past controversies involving prominent Americans whose romantic relationships raised national security concerns.
Why it matters: Foreign intelligence operatives can use romantic relationships to gain access to political intelligence, corporate secrets and classified information — posing serious national security risks.
Driving the news: Jensen Huang acknowledged an extramarital affair in a message to employees Sunday, following reports that he had a relationship with a suspected Chinese spy.
- Per The New York Times, U.S. authorities suspected China's Ministry of State Security of recruiting Alice Huang to seek information about Jensen Huang and influence his feelings about selling AI chips to Chinese firms.
- Nvidia's board says it has no reason to believe company secrets or national security were compromised. China has also denied the allegations.
Zoom out: The evidence of foreign intelligence involvement varies, with some cases involving actual security breaches, while others raised concerns about possible foreign spying.
Read more below.
Jensen Huang
State of play: Reports about Jensen Huang's relationship with Alice Huang have raised questions about whether Chinese intelligence gained access to Nvidia's secrets or sought to influence its business decisions.
- AFP and Reuters photos showed them together in 2024 and 2025.
- Employees reported seeing Jensen Huang at Megaspeed's offices, where Alice Huang worked as an executive, according to Culper Research, a short-seller that published a report on Nvidia's China business in May 2026.
- An employee told Culper that Jensen and Alice had a "very close" relationship.
What's next: Three Republican House committee chairs have requested a briefing with Huang about his relationship with Alice Huang and Nvidia's safeguards against foreign threats.
James J. Smith and Katrina Leung
A 2006 DOJ report found that counterintelligence agent James J. Smith had a secret 18-year affair with Katrina Leung, an FBI informant who was suspected of passing information onto China.
- The investigation found that Leung had provided classified U.S. government information to China without FBI authorization, exposing major failures in the bureau's oversight of informants.
- A DOJ inspector general investigation also found that Leung had an affair with another FBI agent, William Cleveland.
- Smith and Leung were arrested in 2003. Both ultimately pleaded guilty to making false statements, rather than espionage charges.
Maria Butina and Paul Erickson
Russian activist-turned-politician Maria Butina pleaded guilty in 2018 to conspiring to act as an unregistered agent of the Russian government after becoming romantically involved with Republican operative Paul Erickson.
- Federal prosecutors withdrew the allegation that she traded sex for political access, saying they misinterpreted the evidence, per ABC News.
- Prosecutors maintained that Butina used her relationship with Erickson to conceal activities intended to advance Russian interests, according to ABC News.
Eric Swalwell and Christine Fang
FBI records declassified in August 2026 show former Congressman Eric Swalwell acknowledged having sexual encounters with a suspected Chinese operative, Christine Fang, per the Washington Post.
- According to the records, Swalwell said the interactions were casual and that they never formally dated.
Flashback: In 2020, Axios uncovered that Fang had targeted politicians in California, including Swalwell.
- According to reports, Fang participated in fundraising for Swalwell's campaign and helped place an intern in his office.
- Intelligence officials told Axios at the time that Fang gained access to political power through fundraising, networking, personal charisma, and romantic or sexual relationships with at least two Midwestern mayors, too.
- The FBI never accused Swalwell of wrongdoing in connection with his relationship with Fang, per the Washington Post.
Benjamin Bishop
In 2014, defense contractor Benjamin Pierce Bishop pleaded guilty to disclosing classified information to a Chinese woman with whom he had a romantic relationship, according to the Department of Justice.
- Bishop was sentenced to more than seven years in prison for disclosing classified national defense information and unlawfully retaining classified documents.
- According to the DOJ, Bishop, a former Army lieutenant colonel, retrieved a classified photograph of a Chinese naval asset at his girlfriend's request.
