By Randall Yip, Executive Editor
The U.S. Attorney’s office in San Francisco this morning announced the federal grand jury eight count indictment of recalled Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao.
AsAmNews was on the scene seven months ago when FBI agents raided Thao’s home in Oakland. 
The San Francisco Chronicle quoting an anonymous source reported Thursday afternoon that a federal grand jury had indicted Thao on corruption charges.
CBS5 San Francisco reports that Thao this morning turned herself into authorities.
Thao is accused of accepting $95,000 in cash in exchange for extending the contract California Waste Solutions had with the city.
Thao’s partner Andre Jones has also been indicted along with David and Andrew Duong of California Waste Solutions.
“The citizens of Oakland deserve better. The accused in this case fell short of those standards,” said Linda Nguyen of IRS Criminal Investigations said this morning at the news conference.
Patrick Robbins of the U.S. Attorney’s office outlined the elaborate scheme during the news conference.
He said they are accused of entering an agreement weeks before the November 2022 election. He said Thao and Jones accepted the bribe with the understanding that Thao would allow the Duongs to exercise “illegal influence over the leverage of city government.”
Thao became the first Hmong American in the country to be a mayor of a large urban city in 2022. Voters upset about crime in the city voted to recall her this past November.
On the day agents raided Thao’s home on June 20, they also raided the homes of the Duong family. The company had a contract with the city.
“Thao made a commitment to take official action as mayor to benefit the Duongs,” Robbins said.
Robbins said Thao agreed to purchase housing units owned by the Duong family, to extend the contract for recycling services and to benefit their business interests. In exchange, he said Thao accepted money to finance campaign literature that would target her campaign rivals. He said the payments were disguised as payments for a “no show job” with the promise of additional payments.
The defendants are expected in Federal Court in Oakland to face the charges this morning.
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