Owner of NJ sushi joint nabbed by ICE after being convicted of spying for China

An alleged sushi-slinging spy is successful ICE custody. 

Ming Xi Zhang, known arsenic “Sushi John,”  the 61-year-old proprietor of Ya Ya Noodles successful Montgomery Township, NJ, was arrested March 24 by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Newark.

Zhang was convicted successful April 2024 of acting arsenic an unregistered supplier of nan Chinese authorities and sentenced to 3 years’ probation. In May 2021, he pleaded blameworthy to having served arsenic an supplier of China successful 2016 without notifying nan U.S. Attorney General.

ICE says he legally entered nan U.S. successful 2000 but later “violated nan position of his lawful admission.”

Zhang was convicted successful April 2024 of acting arsenic an unregistered supplier of nan Chinese authorities and sentenced to 3 years’ probation. ICE/Facebook

“Any forbidden alien conducting activities related to espionage, sabotage aliases export power against nan United States is taxable to deportation,” said ICE Newark Field Office Director John Tsoukaris.

Zhang met pinch Chinese information officials successful nan Bahamas successful 2016 and delivered $35,000 to an unnamed individual successful New Jersey, according to NJ.com. He besides admitted to doubly hosting a Chinese authorities supplier astatine his Princeton location that fall.

He’s being held at nan Elizabeth Detention Center awaiting migration proceedings, a worker astatine his restaurant told nan Post connected Saturday.

“He’s doing good, I mean, fixed nan circumstances,” the worker said. “But yeah, he’s conscionable benignant of waiting… to get fto out.”

The organization surrounding Zhang’s edifice has apparently rallied astir him and his edifice successful nan days since his arrest. 

“The full municipality has been really supportive,” nan worker said. “Everyone’s been coming in, offering telephone numbers, talking to his family . . . everyone’s really supportive.”

His apprehension comes arsenic ICE ramps up deportations nether President Donald Trump’s renewed enforcement push for wide removals and expanded detention authority complete forbidden immigrants.

The organization surrounding Zhang’s edifice has apparently rallied astir him and his edifice successful nan days since his arrest. Google Maps

The ineligible scenery remains successful flux: conscionable past week, the Supreme Court on Thursday sided successful part with Kilmar Abrego Garcia — a noncitizen who had been deported contempt an progressive entreaty — alternatively sending nan lawsuit backmost to nan little courts to explain whether nan authorities has “facilitated” aliases intends to facilitate his return. 

U.S. District Judge Paul Xinis chastised Justice Department lawyers Friday complete nan government’s stubbornness to comply, while nan Trump management has alleged Abrego Garcia has MS-13 pack ties and has disputed nan scope of nan words “facilitate” and “effectuate” successful nan judge’s order.

Meanwhile, successful a abstracted case, an migration judge ruled that Mahmoud Khalil — flagged by nan State Department arsenic a nationalist information interest stemming from his pro-Palestine picketing connected Columbia’s field — can beryllium deported, though his lawsuit besides remains nether review.

The Post did not person a consequence from Zhang’s lawyer Robert Hazzard.