Florida
‘Who is Mar-a-Lago?’ Arrested Chinese woman appears confused after intrusion at Trump club
The Chinese woman arrested Wednesday after trespassing at Mar-a-Lago, President Donald Trump’s South Florida estate, managed to get to a high-end shopping district about two miles away before she was spotted by police, according to an arrest report from the Palm Beach Police Department.
Lu Jing, 56, was arrested near the Salvatore Ferragamo store along Worth Avenue, an exclusive shopping district in Palm Beach. The arrest report does not make clear how long it took police to respond to a 12:47 p.m. call from Mar-a-Lago security after Lu gained access to the grounds of the private club. When officers confronted Lu at about 1:19 p.m., they said they used a “hand control technique” to detain her after the woman allegedly pulled away shouting “No! No! No!”
Lu was brought to the police department for questioning, then formally charged at 3:36 p.m. — one count of loitering and one count of resisting an officer without violence, both misdemeanors.
Lu first attempted to enter the club around 12:30 p.m. Wednesday through the main entrance, Mar-a-Lago’s security manager Richard Cartolano told police. She was turned away by club security, he said. Lu then headed north along South Ocean Boulevard, the main artery of the exclusive island town of Palm Beach, and walked onto the Mar-a-Lago grounds through an open service entrance.
She made it about 100 yards onto the property and began to take pictures on her cellphone, according to the police report.
Club security again intercepted Lu and called police. When confronted, Lu claimed she did not speak English, according to a person familiar with the incident. Lu fled on foot before officers arrived.
Officer Taylor Molinaro searched the property for the suspicious intruder before issuing a BOLO for a woman in a long-sleeved white shirt, jeans, and pink shoes.
About 25 minutes later, a sergeant with the Palm Beach Police Department spotted Lu walking along Worth Avenue. When he attempted to detain her for questioning, she “balled up her hands into fists and crossed her arms on her chest,” the police report said.
Lu repeatedly shouted “No!” and pulled away from the sergeant, according to the report. The sergeant officer then used the “soft hand control technique” to put Lu in handcuffs.
At the police department, Lu refused to provide a translator with information about pictures she had taken of Mar-A-Lago on her phone or let investigators look at the phone, the arrest report said. Lu then invoked her right to an attorney, ending the questioning.
A spokesperson for the U.S. Secret Service would not say whether the agency was investigating the incident, referring all questions to the Palm Beach Police Department. A spokesperson for the Palm Beach police said it was the agency’s investigation but would not confirm or deny Secret Service involvement.
‘Who is Mar-a-Lago?’
On Thursday morning, Lu, a Chinese national who was in the country on an expired visa, was confused and upset as she appeared in court in West Palm Beach. She was visibly weeping as a Mandarin interpreter was dialed in to translate by phone. Her appointed public defender gently patted her shoulder.
Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Laura Johnson set a bond of $1,000 for each count but told Lu she would remain detained until an immigration hold is lifted.
Johnson also told the defendant she was imposing a no-contact order preventing her from coming within 1,000 feet of Mar-a-Lago if she is released.
“Who is Mar-a-Lago?” Lu replied in Mandarin. “I don’t understand.”
“I’m ordering you to have no contact with the property where you were arrested yesterday,” the judge explained.
Lu asked other questions during the roughly 15-minute hearing, including whether the man standing next to her was her lawyer and if he could help her.
Robert Porter, an assistant public defender representing Lu, declined to comment after the hearing. A spokesperson for the state attorney’s office also declined to comment.
Security concerns
Trump and his family were not in Palm Beach Wednesday when Lu entered the property, so club security was left to a bare-bones team of private guards, employed by the Trump Organization.
Earlier this year, another Chinese national was arrested for unlawfully entering the club.
On March 30, Yujing Zhang, 33, passed through two Secret Service check points but was stopped in the club’s main foyer when she took out her phone and began to record.
Unlike Lu, Zhang was arrested by federal agents, tasked with protecting the property while the president is in town. Zhang was convicted of two federal crimes — trespassing and lying to a federal agent — and sentenced to time served. Trump and his family were not in Palm Beach on Wednesday when the incident occurred.
In addition to Lu and Zhang, at least two other intruders have been arrested on Mar-a-Lago’s grounds since Trump was elected in November 2016.
In January 2017, a woman sneaked onto the grounds in the early morning, spread banana on car windows, and typed expletives on a Mar-a-Lago computer before she was stopped by club security and arrested by Palm Beach Police.
The following year, during a Thanksgiving celebration, a college student breached Secret Service security by walking in from the beach. He was arrested by federal agents after 20 minutes of wandering around the grounds.
In both cases, the trespassers were let off with only minor charges.
Experts say Mar-a-Lago poses serious national security challenges, most notably because club members and staff have nearly unfettered access to the grounds where the president and his family live.
“It’s an extremely porous location,” said David Kris, assistant attorney general for national security during the Obama administration and founder of Culper Partners. Kris said access could easily be exploited by agents working for adversary governments.
“The president is the world’s number one intelligence target. And our adversaries will literally stop at nothing to get at him,” Kris said.
In late 2018, federal agents opened an investigation into possible Chinese espionage in South Florida. The probe is ongoing.
Mixed reaction at home and abroad
Top comments on QQ, a popular Chinese news website, ranged from “We don’t want [her], just give [her] to America,” to reactions that were critical of the United States.
“In America, no matter you break the law or not, the U.S. government will just arrest the people they want,” another commenter said. “How could they talk about democracy and freedom? That is a terrifying place, where there’s no reason and morality.”
Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump administration have commented on the latest security breach at the so-called Winter White House.
At a Wednesday rally in Battle Creek, Michigan, however, Trump complained about his assigned security detail after it failed to remove a protester quickly enough.
“This is one person who made a horrible gesture only because the security man let her have so much time,” Trump said, according to the Hill.
He accused the security personnel of being too gentle and politely asking the woman to leave instead of grabbing her by the wrist.
“You gotta get a little bit stronger than that, folks,” Trump said.
Lu was detained on a Palm Beach street studded with A-list designer stores, including Valentino, Chanel and Van Cleef & Arpels.
Marla Degraeve, the general manager of the Ferragamo shop near where Lu was detained, said she saw a police van on Worth Avenue Wednesday afternoon but did not observe anything else unusual.
But Mor Nahom, an employee of Senses Skin Lounge across the street, said he witnessed a police officer approach Lu near a curving palm tree outside Ferragamo early Wednesday afternoon.
He said Lu was crying and shouting during the encounter but seemed to stop resisting after being handcuffed. Within five or 10 minutes, he said, another police officer came to assist and she was taken away.
“I thought maybe she was stealing from one of the stores or something,” Nahom said.
Miami Herald writer Shelly CI contributed to this report.
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