High Season at Mar-a-Lago Is Over, but Concern Over Security Lingers
PALM BEACH, Fla. — At Mar-a-Lago, President Trump’s private club and favorite winter destination, members who have paid $200,000 to belong rely on the comfort of routines: Prime-rib night is every Thursday, croquet clinics are on Sundays and a lavish Mother’s Day brunch — featuring caviar and “shrimp the size of a baby’s arm,” as members like to say — always closes the season.
But this year, the order of things was disrupted over and over again.
A government shutdown prevented Mr. Trump — always his own club’s guest of honor — from visiting over the Christmas holidays. Then a charity event had to be canceled after a woman who was helping sell tickets turned out to be connected to a prostitution sting at a nearby massage parlor. But the arrest of a gate-crasher in March — a 33-year-old woman from China who tried to brandish an invitation to an event that did not exist — raised concerns that the business involved with brokering access to the president’s private club had collided with efforts to keep the president safe.
The woman, Zhang Yujing, was found with a trove of curious electronics, including a thumb drive initially believed to be infected with malware, and four cellphones. The authorities also found that she had a signal detector used to find hidden secret cameras.
Lisa M. Ruth, a former C.I.A. officer who now runs a private intelligence and security company in Palm Beach County, said the episode was a gaping hole in the president’s security apparatus. She said there was “no doubt” in her mind that Ms. Zhang was a spy, for either a corporation or a government.
“I talk to a lot of intelligence officers — it’s not 98 percent of us that believe she was a spy,” Ms. Ruth said. “It’s 100.”
But Mr. Trump has publicly shrugged off any concerns that his club was not secure. Eventually, his club members started doing the same.
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