A Liberal Party financier who attended a cash-for-access fundraiser for Prime Minister Trudeau in 2016 is under investigation for having ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

Shenglin Xian is one of three founders of the Chinese-oriented Wealth One Bank of Canada who’s under investigation by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). Wealth One caters towards Chinese-Canadians.

On Thursday, the Globe and Mail reported CSIS has been investigating the three founders and the bank itself since 2021.

Just months after Xian attended the 2016 Liberal Party fundraiser, Xian’s then-unapproved Wealth One Bank of Canada was approved by regulators to conduct business in Canada as a Schedule 1 bank. 

Also at the same fundraiser as Xian was then-Chinese Communist Party advisor Zhang Bin, who later donated one million dollars to the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation. Donations to the Trudeau Foundation increased ten fold between 2014 and 2016, the two years between Trudeau first getting elected Prime Minister.

Trudeau has admitted that he gets lobbied at said fundraisers but insisted policies were never impacted.

The Globe reports that the three founders under investigation from Wealth One Bank of Canada resigned their bank directorships in December after Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland sent them a letter alleging money laundering and possible Chinese government coercion.   

Wealth One Bank of Canada had over $400 million in assets in 2021, after an initial investment of only $50 million five years prior.

Additionally, Ontario Liberal MP Charles Sousa was on the bank’s board of directors up until the month he was elected. In December, Sousa won a highly anticipated by-election for the riding of Mississauga Lakeshore against Conservative opponent Ron Chhinzer.

Last month, it was revealed that the Chinese Communist Party interfered in Canada’s 2021 election to help the Trudeau Liberals win and cause the Conservatives to lose.