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Roman Balmakov

Roman Balmakov was an American journalist who served as a Senior Account Executive and Account Manager for the advertising department at The Epoch Times, a conservative newspaper owned by the Chinese Falun Gong cult. Balmakov went to school in Ohio, graduating from Beachwood High School and then from Daytona State College, receiving a law degree. He then became an adherent of Falun Gong (along with his wife Christine Yee-Le Lin) and worked as a newspaper deliveryman for The Epoch Times for several years, claiming that his newspaper was "a shining golden light" and that he felt his soul ascend to the sky while biking down his delivery route. In 2020, he received attention from The New York Times and other news outlets after Epoch Times ads promoting anti-Democratic Party and anti-China conspiracy theories were banned from Facebook, only to shift to having a frequent presence in YouTube ads. In April 2020, Canadian postal union representative Derek Richmond filed a special request to stop postal workers from delivering the newspaper, as its front cover - calling COVID-19 the "CCP virus" - promoted Sinophobia and could put some of the Asian letter carriers at risk. However, the Canadian government declined to take action. In May 2020, Balmakov appeared in a new ad again accusing the Chinese government of being responsible for COVID-19.

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