Stanford provides protection, CCP member's daughter testifies

Taking the stand for the second day, the daughter of a senior Chinese Communist Party member fighting to archive her father's manuscripts and diaries at Stanford University told a federal judge on Tuesday that she wanted to be affiliated with the university for political protection. 

It was obvious that the Chinese government was closely watching her as she worked to transcribe her father Li Rui's writings, Nanyang Li testified, adding that she became a U.S. citizen this year. 

A member of the Chinese Communist Party since the 1930s, Li Rui later served as a personal secretary to Mao Zedong and became a vocal dissident against the party's agenda. Li Rui kept extensive written records about his life and experiences and was expelled for 20 years from the party because of his opposing views. 

Li Rui's widow and Nanyang Li's stepmother, Yuzhen Zhang, has claimed ownership of his papers and has asked U.S. District Judge Jon S. Tigar in Oakland to enforce a Beijing court's judgment in her favor. A bench trial in this matter started on Monday. 

However, Stanford University's attorneys at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP have argued that Li Rui always intended for his works to be preserved by the university's Hoover Institution and would not want his diaries in the hands of the Chinese government. Li Rui died in February 2019 at 101. Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Junior University v. Zhang et al., 4:19-cv-02904-JST (N.D. Cal., filed May 24, 2019). 

After retiring from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, "I became a regular Chinese citizen. Hoover gave me a business card that was protection for me. They couldn't arrest me ... they would think twice," testified Nanyang Li, a former visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution. 

Zhang's attorneys at Skaggs Faucette LLP have argued that there is no formal written agreement between Li Rui and the Hoover Institution to store his manuscripts and that the compilation of her father's diaries was Nanyang Li's personal project. 

Nanyang Li, who deposited several of her father's papers at the institution, said it was out of the question for her father to sign the deposit agreement as a high-ranking Chinese Communist Party member. If Li Rui was accused of colluding with foreign countries, "that would become a very serious crime," she testified. 

Nanyang Li explained to Tigar that she was committed to compiling Li Rui's writings because her father spoke highly of the Hoover Institution since visiting many decades ago and was impressed with the research institute's collection. Li Rui knew that such a collection of works would not be allowed to exist in China, Nanyang Li added. 

Asked by Pillsbury senior counsel Jeffrey D. Wexler why she decided to go ahead with the project despite Stanford not offering grants or extra funds, Nanyang Li said she cared the most about continuing her family legacy. Items such as Li Rui's personal notebook recounting the Lushan Conference of 1959 were "too valuable" to the historical record and would likely be destroyed in China, she added. The Lushan Conference was a meeting between Mao and top Chinese Communist Party leaders to discuss the country's "Great Leap Forward," an economic campaign to modernize the agrarian economy which led to one of the largest famines in history, killing tens of millions.

"It's my honor and privilege to get this opportunity to preserve my father's historical material," said Nanyang Li, later tearfully recounting her father's last days. "I knew the CCP wouldn't do anything to hurt him anymore. My father's wish was to donate all of his material to Hoover. I wanted to fulfill his wish when he was still alive," she said. 

According to Zhang's attorneys, Li Rui's works belong with his widow in his homeland as determined by a Beijing court. Skaggs Faucette partner Jeffrey E. Faucette told the judge during his opening statement that Stanford University's attorneys skipped several procedural steps and misled the Chinese court. 

Testifying about her stepmother on Tuesday, Nanyang Li said Zhang never understood her late husband's politics and, as a devoted Chinese Communist Party member, did not place the same importance on his diaries. Nanyang Li added that she was certain the Chinese government was funding her stepmother's litigation after seeing an email address format commonly used by the party on Zhang's laptop. Nanyang Li's attorneys displayed several exhibits with Li Rui's diary entries describing Zhang's reluctance to transcribe his papers. 

Li Rui warned her to be careful around Zhang but never wanted to turn her against her stepmother, Nanyang Li told the judge. "He always emphasized that she is a good person. He did not want me to have any negative feelings against her because she took really good care of my father ... She just didn't understand," said Nanyang Li.