It's just their politics based on that ignorance that does. For example, we immigrants all know "U.S. resident" is the term referred to foreigners, Aliens. The U.S. resident number always start from A, which means Alien, then followed by 9 digit number. In immigrant circle, you can often hear people saying, Zhang is still a resident because he wants to go to back to China after retirement. Wang is just a resident now but she plans to become citizen once her years of resident status reach requirement... We all understand the term U.S. resident means you are foreigner, alien. But, during Khashoggi incident, Chris, Frank and Conor repeated used this term U.S. resident to mislead people who know little immigration.
Conor is worse, twice called Khashoggi a Virginia resident. I know Conor know nothing about immigration. He just followed politicians (Tim" Kaine) and media using it. But, a Virginia resident is a tax term, not immigration term. For example, if you have properties not just in Virginia, but also in Washington state, WA will view you a Washington resident too, not just VA view you as their resident. The term is just for tax purpose. As I said, about 80% of top Chinese officials, their family members are living in foreign countries and have properties, including Huawei's CFO Ms. Meng who has Canada green card and whose 2 daughters are Canada green card holders (Meng's husband is a resident of some country too, unclear which country, perhaps also Canada). You never hear they call Meng a Canada resident. Because a Canada resident is still a foreigner, a Chinese citizen in this case.