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Chinese Government Advisory Group Paid Mark Brzezinski $1K for Speech

Biden's choice for Poland ambassador is MSNBC host's brother

Biden nominee for ambassador to Poland Mark Brzezinski / Getty Images
August 20, 2021

An advisory group for the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee this year paid $1,000 to Mark Brzezinski, President Biden's nominee for ambassador to Poland.

The China Development Forum paid Brzezinski, the brother of MSNBC host Mika Brzezinski and son of former National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, for a written contribution to its annual conference in March, according to a financial disclosure obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. The forum is organized each year by the Development Research Center of the State Council, which advises the Communist Party's Central Committee.

Brzezinski, who runs a consulting firm, served as ambassador to Sweden during the Obama administration. While China is unlikely to be Brzezinski's main diplomatic focus should he be confirmed, the United States has sought to unite European allies against China's growing influence in the West. China overtook the United States as Europe's main trading partner this year and is seeking to draw other American allies further into its orbit.

Several other Biden diplomatic nominees have links to organizations tied to the Chinese Communist Party. Caroline Kennedy, the nominee for ambassador to Australia, and Eric Garcetti, the nominee for ambassador to India, served on the board of the Asia Society, which is affiliated with Chinese state-controlled propaganda organizations. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, received a $1,500 honorarium in 2019 for a speech funded by the Confucius Institute, a Chinese state-controlled organization accused of serving as a propaganda vehicle for Beijing.

Brzezinski first spoke at the China Development Forum in 2019, where he was listed as one of three special guests of the symposium. Another guest was Neil Bush, the son of George H.W. Bush. Bush is chairman of the Bush-China Foundation, which received more than $5 million in 2019 from the China-U.S. Exchange Foundation, an alleged front group for the Chinese Communist Party.

In his 2019 speech at the China Development Forum, Brzezinski expressed concern that elements within the United States were "demonizing" China and "scaring U.S. businesspeople away from normal business engagement."

Brzezinski did not mention China's expansive list of human rights abuses but instead praised Chinese leaders for seeking to change the "international system" in a "patient, prudent, and peaceful fashion."

Brzezinski reiterated his comments in an interview on CGTN, a Chinese state-controlled propaganda network. He also recalled that his family hosted Communist Party leader Deng Xiaoping at their home in 1979, when his father, Zbigniew Brzezinski, served as national security adviser to Jimmy Carter. Mark Brzezinski told a story about his sister, Mika, spilling caviar on Deng, who would later oversee the Tiananmen Square massacre.

Brzezinski boasts on his consulting firm's website that he "builds on his father's legacy by maintaining regular business in China, where he is frequently welcomed by various organizations as a featured speaker or visiting lecturer."

Brzezinski did not respond to a request for comment.