Former Epoch Times Finance Chief Pleads Guilty

Interior of a historic courtroom with wooden furniture and an American flag

The former top money man at a major conservative media outlet has now admitted he helped move tens of millions in dirty money through its bank accounts.

Story Snapshot

Ex–Epoch Times chief financial officer Weidong “Bill” Guan pleaded guilty in a $67 million money laundering conspiracy.
Prosecutors say the scheme used stolen identities, fake accounts, and cryptocurrency to wash fraudulently obtained unemployment benefits.
The money flowed through The Epoch Times’ bank and related accounts, raising fresh questions about how partisan media are funded.
The case highlights how complex money networks and weak safeguards let criminal cash prop up powerful institutions.

Guilty plea in a $67 million laundering conspiracy

Federal prosecutors in New York say former Epoch Times chief financial officer Weidong “Bill” Guan was a key player in a sprawling scheme to launder at least $67 million in criminal proceeds through media company accounts. Guan, 63, interrupted jury selection in his Manhattan federal trial to plead guilty to a single conspiracy charge tied to the money laundering operation. In court, he admitted taking part in the plot to move fraud money through The Epoch Times’ bank accounts and related entities.

Prosecutors say the scheme ran from about 2020 to May 2024, at the height of pandemic unemployment programs that became a magnet for fraud. According to the indictment, Guan and others used a team inside the company called “Make Money Online” to buy crime proceeds at a discount using cryptocurrency. Those funds, including fraudulently obtained unemployment benefits, were then pushed into accounts held by the media company and related entities, boosting the outlet’s reported revenue.

How the scheme worked: stolen identities and crypto pipelines

Court documents say the operation relied heavily on stolen personal information to open bank and other financial accounts that could receive and move illicit funds. Participants allegedly bought prepaid debit cards loaded with fraudulently obtained unemployment benefits using a cryptocurrency platform, then drained and shifted the money into accounts tied to the media company. Prosecutors say some funds also moved through Guan’s personal bank and cryptocurrency accounts before being absorbed into the broader financial network around The Epoch Times.

When banks started asking why millions of dollars in new money were suddenly flowing into the company, prosecutors say Guan did not level with them. Instead, he allegedly told banks that the spikes came from legitimate small-dollar donations from supporters of the outlet. A detailed Justice Department filing says Guan made “multiple false statements” about the source of funds during the scheme, even as those funds “drove the media company’s increased revenue in 2020 and 2021.” Those misrepresentations now sit at the heart of the criminal case against him.

What this means for The Epoch Times and media trust

The Epoch Times has said the charges do not involve its newsgathering or editorial decisions, and prosecutors have stressed the same in official filings. Still, the case exposes how the financial side of partisan media outlets can become tangled with high-risk or criminal money flows that the public never sees. Guan’s role as chief financial officer meant he controlled the systems that kept the outlet funded and expanding during a period when its audience and political influence grew sharply.

This case also fits a larger pattern flagged by financial crime watchdogs, who warn that professional money laundering networks increasingly use cryptocurrency, prepaid cards, and stolen identities to move fraud proceeds. For Americans across the political spectrum, the story cuts in two painful ways at once. Taxpayers see that pandemic unemployment programs they funded were looted, then washed into powerful institutions. And media consumers who already distrust news organizations now have another example of how money and influence can be quietly twisted behind the scenes.