Former aide to New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, Linda Sun, who is charged with helping Chinese authorities, is unable to pay her defense team’s fees, according to her lawyers.

Sun and her husband, Chris Hu, are facing a retrial after their first trial late last year ended with a hung jury.

At an update meeting with the judge on Jan. 28, prosecutors agreed to delay the retrial until Jan. 18, 2027, to give Sun and Hu time to negotiate with the government or find new representation for the next trial.

In January, prosecutors made a new plea offer to both Sun and Hu. Those offers expire on Feb. 2. However, their defense team says it hasn’t been paid and may quit if no deal can be reached and the government refuses to allow them to sell their assets.

In November 2025 and December 2025, Sun and Hu were tried on 19 charges. Sun was tried for acting as a Chinese agent, for bribery in connection with state contracts, for money laundering, and for visa fraud. Hu was charged with money laundering, misuse of someone else’s identification, bank fraud, and tax evasion.

The jury could not come to a unanimous verdict on any of the charges, and a mistrial was declared in December 2025. Their attorneys asked District Judge Brian Cogan to force the government to release Sun and Hu’s seized assets: a house in Manhasset, New York, currently valued at about $4 million; a 47th-floor condo in Hawaii currently valued at $2.1 million; and a 2024 Ferrari Roma, a 2024 Range Rover L460, and a 2022 Mercedes GLB250W4.

“I think we have made it abundantly clear that the defendant does not have any assets to pay us,” said Nicole Boeckmann, attorney for Hu, at a virtual conference with the judge and prosecution.

“We have been unpaid for the duration of the trial.”

However, Cogan said he was not convinced that the couple did not have additional undisclosed assets and refused to force the government to release the assets.

“The answer is no,” he said.

Cogan also said he wanted the defense team to stay on the case for the retrial and welcomed the defense counsel to present new evidence as to why he should allow Sun and Hu’s assets to be unfrozen.

“The government has made it impossible for Mr. Hu and his wife to fund their defense. We very much want to continue to represent Mr. Hu, and he is entitled to that representation, but absent the release [of] these assets, we may be unable to do so,” said Boeckmann in an emailed statement.

Sun worked for Hochul and former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. She was part of a task force looking for vendors of ventilators, masks, and gloves at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020. During that time, prosecutors alleged, Sun promoted her husband and his business partners for contracts, taking advantage of her role and receiving millions of dollars in kickbacks from vendors.

Sun and Hu allegedly laundered the kickbacks received, routing them through shell companies, dummy accounts, and close friends.