Chris Butler is Tulsi Gabbard's guru, the head of the Science of Identity Foundation, and he exerted near-total control over her political life. For four decades he kept secret from almost everyone, including most of his own followers, his personal ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

Those ties run deep. Butler published anti-Western propaganda through five CCP state publishing houses. ²⁴ His wife, Zhang Huilan (Wai Lana), built a multimillion-dollar brand on CCP state television, generating millions through an opaque network of entities with zero public financial disclosure. His top operative, Sunil Khemaney, was originally based in Hong Kong, where he interacted with CCP entities on Butler's behalf before relocating to the United States. Khemaney managed both the finances of the Wai Lana empire and Tulsi's political operation, serving as her chief strategist, fundraiser, and official spokesman to the Washington Post. The same man bridged Butler's CCP ties and Tulsi's political career. ²⁵

Why his positions served the axis

Butler spent years obsessively directing then-Congressmember Tulsi Gabbard's Middle East foreign policy. The transcripts show him writing talking points, drafting legislation, and coaching her for media appearances hundreds of times. Out of 916 political transcripts in the forensic database, 91 focus on Saudi Arabia alone, roughly 10 percent of the entire corpus aimed at a single foreign policy target. ¹

Butler directed Tulsi to attack Saudi Arabia

Across 91 transcripts, Butler pushed her to cut all U.S. arms sales to Saudi Arabia, impose sanctions, and blame the kingdom for funding terrorism worldwide.

China armed terrorists fighting Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia has been at war with the Houthis, an Iran-backed armed group in Yemen, since 2015. The Houthis were designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the United States in 2021 and again in 2025. ⁴ While that war raged, Chinese weapons were flowing to the Houthis.

• Between 2021 and 2023, the U.S. Navy seized 9,000 Chinese-made rifles being smuggled to the Houthis. ⁵
• The U.S. Treasury sanctioned procurement operatives in Iran and China that enabled Houthi weapons acquisition, including the Chinese company Shenzhen Boyu. ⁶
• In March 2025, Yemeni authorities intercepted 800 Chinese drone propellers being smuggled to the Houthis through the Oman-Yemen border. ⁷

Under the National Intelligence Law passed by China's National People's Congress in 2017, every Chinese company and citizen is legally required to cooperate with state intelligence services. Chinese companies are not independent commercial actors; they are extensions of the CCP's strategic apparatus. ⁸

China armed a designated terrorist organization at war with an American ally.

China courted Saudi influence while arming their enemy

At the same time Chinese weapons were reaching the Houthis, China was courting Saudi Arabia diplomatically and economically. In March 2023, China brokered the historic Saudi-Iran normalization deal in Beijing, directly displacing U.S. diplomatic influence in the region. ⁹ China's Belt and Road Initiative has invested roughly $101 billion in the six Gulf Cooperation Council states, nearly 42 percent of its total investment in the greater Middle East. ¹⁰

China played both sides. Butler directed Tulsi to cut U.S.-Saudi arms cooperation. As the alliance strained, China filled the vacuum.

Russia's lifeline: Butler protected Assad

Butler's obsession with protecting the Assad regime is documented in 204 transcripts. This was Tulsi's signature foreign policy position, and it came directly from him.

At the United Nations, Russia and China vetoed Security Council resolutions on Syria repeatedly, shielding Assad from consequences. Amnesty International called the veto use "shameful." ¹² Brookings documented how Russia and China leadership "props up Syria's Assad." ¹³

For Russia, this was not abstract. Assad's survival kept open Russia's naval base at Tartus, its only direct access to the Mediterranean and a station for warships and submarines, plus the Khmeimim airbase. ¹⁴ Butler's "protect Assad" position protected Russia's Mediterranean lifeline. When the Assad regime finally fell in December 2024, Russia lost that foothold and began withdrawing its warships from Tartus. ¹⁵

The bigger picture: one axis, two powers

China and Russia are not acting separately. In February 2022, days before Russia invaded Ukraine, the two governments declared a "no limits" partnership. It has only deepened since, reaffirmed at the Putin-Xi summit in Beijing in May 2026, and analysts describe it as the driver of an anti-Western axis built to weaken and reshape the global order. ¹⁶

The military cooperation is real. Iran supplied Russia with thousands of Shahed drones for the war in Ukraine, which Russia rebranded the Geran-2 and now builds domestically; in return Russia offered Iran missiles, air defense, and electronics. ¹⁷ And both powers gain the most when the United States is tied down elsewhere. The "pivot to Asia" that Washington announced in 2011 never happened, and strategists acknowledge that America's entanglement in the Middle East gave China room to maneuver on Taiwan and the South China Sea while Russia pressed its advantage in Europe. ¹⁸

This week: reviving a Kremlin war narrative

On June 12, 2026, in her final days as Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard released a video and "declassified" documents claiming the U.S. government had funded more than 120 biolabs in over 30 countries, including 40 in Ukraine working with dangerous pathogens. ¹⁹

The "U.S. bioweapons labs in Ukraine" story is a known Russian disinformation narrative, one Moscow used to help justify its 2022 invasion. Ukraine's Foreign Ministry rejected Gabbard's claims as baseless, and biosecurity experts described them as a conspiracy theory. ²⁰ Gabbard had pushed the same narrative once before, in March 2022, weeks after Russia invaded. At the time, Senator Mitt Romney called her comments "a repetition of Russian propaganda," and President Zelensky dismissed them. ²¹

The narrative she revived casts Russia's invasion of Ukraine as something other than aggression. That is exactly what the Kremlin wants the world to believe.

The pattern

Where we are now

On February 28, 2026, the United States and Israel began strikes against Iran. Iran's response included closing the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly 20 percent of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas passes. A ceasefire was reached on April 7 and 8, 2026, but shipping through the strait remains far below normal. ²² American military resources that could be countering Chinese aggression in the Pacific are tied up in the Middle East, exactly what U.S. strategists warned about for over a decade.

While the U.S. fights in the Middle East, China continues to expand its military presence in the South China Sea, conducting a record number of operations in 2025, and to build the infrastructure to replace American influence worldwide. ²³ Every year the U.S. spends focused on the Middle East is a year the China-Russia axis uses to advance.

The facts

Butler published anti-Western propaganda for five CCP state publishers. He then spent years directing then-Congressmember Tulsi Gabbard's Middle East policy. His positions weakened American alliances and created space for both China and Russia. While he pushed "stop arming terrorists" through Tulsi, Chinese-made weapons were being seized en route to terrorist groups in the region, and Russia's hold on Syria protected its only Mediterranean naval base.

That Congresswoman was confirmed as Director of National Intelligence in February 2025, gaining oversight of 18 intelligence agencies and the highest security clearances in the United States government. In her final days in that role, she amplified a Russian propaganda narrative about Ukraine.

These are documented facts.