{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=415840", "OSV News article on Smith hearing'Advocates urge Trump to push for Jimmy Lai release during Xi\u2019s state visit to the US'", "2026-09-16", "2026", "2026-09", "Republican", "House", "NJ", "Christopher H. Smith", "S000522", "chrissmith.house.gov", "chrissmith", "https://chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentquery.aspx", "scraper", "By Kate Scanlon\n\nPublished 2:43 PM September 16, 2026\n\nWASHINGTON (OSV News) \u2014 President Donald Trump is scheduled to host Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the White House in late September, and advocates for Hong Kong\u2019s prominent Catholic media tycoon and pro-democracy campaigner Jimmy Lai said Trump should push for his release from prison during the summit.\n\nRep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., a Catholic, who is a longtime lawmaker and co-chair of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, held a hearing Sept. 16 examining Lai\u2019s imprisonment, with Lai\u2019s son, Sebastien Lai, among the witnesses.\n\nTrump and other U.S. officials have pushed for Lai\u2019s release and have cast the charges leading to Lai\u2019s conviction on national security offenses under the city\u2019s controversial national security law as fabricated, arguing that they were evidence that the Chinese Communist Party is seeking to silence dissent.\n\nSebastien Lai, son of Jimmy Lai, a prominent Hong Kong Catholic, philanthropist and media mogul, poses for a portrait in London Dec. 15, 2025, next to a campaign poster featuring imagery of his father during an interview with Reuters. He gave the interview after his father was found guilty under Hong Kong's national security law of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces and to publish seditious material. Jimmy Lai was sentenced to 20 years imprisonment Feb. 9, 2026. He pleaded not guilty to all charges during his trial. (OSV News photo/Toby Melville, Reuters)\n\nSmith: Trump \u2018has to be absolutely unmovable\u2019\n\nAt a May summit in China, Trump asked Xi to release political prisoners of interest to the U.S., including Jimmy Lai and Ezra Jin Mingri, founder and pastor of Zion Church. U.S. officials expressed grave religious freedom concerns in both cases.\n\nRep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., is pictured in an Oct. 11, 2022. Smith, a Catholic who is a longtime lawmaker and co-chair of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, held a hearing Sept. 16, 2026, examining Jimmy Lai\u2019s imprisonment, with Lai\u2019s son, Sebastien Lai, among the witnesses. (OSV News photo/U.S House of Representatives/Handout via Reuters)\n\nAs a result of that summit, Jin was released from imprisonment and reunited with his family in the U.S. shortly before Independence Day, but Lai remains in prison, where he is serving a 20-year sentence.\n\nAsked after the hearing how he would advise the White House to shift its strategy on Lai\u2019s release, Smith told OSV News that during the upcoming meeting, Trump \u201chas to be absolutely unmovable.\u201d\n\n\u201cOne quick phone call, and it\u2019s done,\u201d Smith said of Xi\u2019s power to authorize the release. \u201cAnd that\u2019s what President Trump has to convey.\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t mince your words,\u201d Smith continued. \u201cThat doesn\u2019t mean you have to be rude. Just say, \u2018Hey, we care about this wonderful man. Why don\u2019t you?\u2019 So I\u2019m hoping President Trump will be very upfront and persistent. Don\u2019t take no for an answer.\u201d\n\nThe White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment about whether Trump plans to raise the issue of Lai\u2019s imprisonment with Xi during the state visit.\n\n\u2018Oldest political prisoner in Hong Kong\u2019\n\nAt the hearing, Sebastien Lai said, \u201cAt 78, he is the oldest political prisoner in Hong Kong, with his 20-year sentence looming over him. If he\u2019s not free soon, he will most likely die in prison.\u201d\n\nJimmy Lai\u2019s release, witnesses and Smith argued, has also taken on newfound urgency because his daughter, Claire Lai, 30, was recently diagnosed with cancer.\n\nClaire Lai, Smith said in remarks at the hearing, \u201cwas initially scheduled to join her brother today.\u201d\n\n\u201cSadly, Claire was recently diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer and has begun treatment. We are thinking of her, praying for her, and wishing her a full recovery,\u201d he said.\n\nSebastien Lai testified he was with his sister as she began chemotherapy in London earlier in September.\n\n\u201cMy father learned of his own daughter\u2019s diagnosis from a maximum-security prison,\u201d Sebastien Lai said. \u201cHe cannot hold her hand. She wants nothing more than to have him with her for this fight. We hope the Chinese authorities will consider what compassionate release would mean for her, and for a 78-year-old man who has already suffered enough.\u201d\n\nJimmy Lai, a prominent Hong Kong Catholic, philanthropist and media mogul, is pictured in Hong Kong May 29, 2020. Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., a Catholic who is a longtime lawmaker and co-chair of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, held a hearing Sept. 16, 2026, examining Lai\u2019s imprisonment, with Lai\u2019s son, Sebastien Lai, among the witnesses. (OSV News photo/Tyrone Siu, Reuters)\n\nBipartisan support for Lai\u2019s release\n\nLai has bipartisan support from U.S. officials. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., another Catholic lawmaker who has advocated for the release of Lai and other Chinese prisoners of conscience, said in remarks on the House floor earlier in September, \u201cthis House and this Congress have always joined together in a bipartisan way for freedom \u2014 whether in Hong Kong, Tibet or elsewhere in China \u2014 for human rights in China.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us not forget Jimmy Lai,\u201d she said, adding, \u201cWe must speak out for freedom. We must not let this be ignored.\u201d\n\nSebastien Lai expressed appreciation for the support the family has received from Trump and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, calling it \u201cmoral courage, and my family does not take it for granted.\u201d\n\nImprisoned since December 2020\n\nJimmy Lai, who founded the now-defunct pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, protested in favor of democratic freedoms \u2014 such as freedom of the press and expression \u2014 in Hong Kong, which was designated a Special Administrative Region of China in 1997, ending British rule of that area after more than 150 years. Following pro-democracy protests in 2019, China implemented a purported national security law the next year, which critics have said has been used to silence the Chinese Communist Party\u2019s critics.\n\nUnder that law, Lai was arrested in August 2020 and has been imprisoned since December 2020. He pleaded not guilty to the charges before his Dec. 15 conviction.\n\nOn Sept. 15, Lai\u2019s international legal team called for his release at the United Nations\u2019 Human Rights Council.", 1, "2026-09-17T09:52:05Z", "2026-09-17T09:53:00Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=415840"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.818910077214241, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}