Ahead of the November US presidential election, Donald Tang, an East-West dealmaker who previously failed to strike it big in Hollywood and now serves as Shein’s executive chairman, was making the rounds in Washington, dropping in to chat with China hawks skeptical of the company. “He was totally, chapter and verse, singing the MAGA hymn of ‘I love Trump. I love America,’” says Michael Sobolik, a senior fellow at the conservative Hudson Institute think tank who has been critical of Shein and other Chinese companies’ lobbying efforts and met with Tang in June.
By then, Shein—once naive about how things work in Washington—had learned to play the uniquely American game of naked influence peddling. An eight-page Shein internal document from June 2023 reviewed by WIRED titled “U.S. Public Affairs Campaign Working Group List,” outlined what the company’s vast team of public and government relations professionals and some lobbyists was tasked with working on, including focus areas like US-China relations and media outreach.
Greer was then working as a partner at the law firm King & Spalding, and his focus area was described as “legal advice around international trade policy.” Two other King & Spalding partners are also listed on the document as providing guidance to Shein on related issues, such as crafting potential congressional testimony and handling investigations launched by lawmakers. King & Spalding continues to work with Shein, according to a person familiar with the situation. The law firm did not respond to requests for comment.
During Trump’s first administration, Greer served as chief of staff to the trade representative, and then went on to join King & Spalding in 2020, according to an announcement from the firm. It is unclear when his work for Shein began or how it was structured. A mandated financial disclosure that Greer filed in December 2024 before he was confirmed does not mention Shein or any of its related companies.
It does note, however, that Greer provided services to 51 additional clients that remained confidential because “disclosure of the client identity and the fact of representation would reveal a client confidence or secret.” In a separate ethics agreement about potential conflicts of interest, Greer promised to “not participate personally and substantially in any particular matter” involving parties represented by King & Spalding for one year after his resignation without prior authorization.
A former Shein employee, who asked not to be identified because of fear of retaliation, says that Greer previously advised Leonard Lin, Shein’s Europe, the Middle East and Africa President and global head of public affairs. One project Greer worked on, the former employee says, was assisting Lin with drafting a response to questions about Shein’s business practices raised by a bipartisan group of senators.
The senators wrote in February 2023 to Xu Yangtian, Shein’s founder, seeking more information on the company’s alleged possible ties to supply chains in China’s Xinjiang region, where the Chinese government has been accused of widespread human rights abuses against a local Muslim minority population. The letter followed a report by Bloomberg the previous year that found cotton in some Shein products it commissioned for testing matched materials that had been produced with cotton from Xinjiang.
