{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=415867", "The Epoch Times article on Smith hearing'\"Bring Them Home\": Americans Push to Free Loved Ones Jailed in China'", "2026-09-23", "2026", "2026-09", "Republican", "House", "NJ", "Christopher H. Smith", "S000522", "chrissmith.house.gov", "chrissmith", "https://chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentquery.aspx", "scraper", "By Eva Fu\n\nPublished September 23, 2026\n\nWASHINGTON\u2014With the U.S.\u2013China summit approaching, Americans who have loved ones detained in China are pleading with President Donald Trump not to forget them.\n\nOne of them is 20-year U.S. Army veteran Nelson Wells, whose son, Nelson Wells Jr., has been in Chinese prison for 12 years on charges that the family says are dubious.\n\nAt a hearing held by the Congressional-Executive Commission on China on Sept. 22, Wells appealed to the U.S. president \u201cfather to father.\u201d\n\nWeeks ago, his son was diagnosed with hepatitis C. He is set to be released in 2041. But with Wells Jr.\u2019s deteriorating health, including chronic pain, high blood pressure, diabetes, and seizures, Wells said he\u2019s not sure whether his son could last that long.\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s sick. His family has suffered. There\u2019s no justice in allowing him to die in prison,\u201d Wells said.\n\nHe said Wells Jr.\u2019s daughter, now 12, \u201chas never seen her father outside photographs\u201d and prays at night \u201cfor someone who can bring him home.\u201d\n\nTrump can be that someone, he said.\n\nRep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), who hosted the hearing, agreed that the United States cannot look away.\n\nFreeing political prisoners needs to be on the U.S.\u2013China summit agenda, he told The Epoch Times.\n\n\u201cIt has to be\u2014period,\u201d he said.\n\nThe congressman said he hopes the president can convey \u201ca sense of urgency and compassion\u201d for \u201cthese suffering individuals.\u201d\n\nSeated next to Wells at the witness table was Tim Hunt, whose sister, Dawn Michelle Hunt, like Wells\u2019s son, was arrested in China in 2014 for alleged drug smuggling. Both families deny the accusations.\n\nWhile visiting his sister in July, Hunt said, he didn\u2019t recognize the sibling he had last seen two years ago.\n\n\u201cShe has aged dramatically. Her posture is that of someone much older. She is slumped over,\u201d he said. He noticed how her teeth had yellowed and shifted, and how her hair had grayed.\n\nWhen they met, he said, she kept asking when she would be freed, and he couldn\u2019t give her an answer.\n\nIn January, their father passed away at age 92.\n\n\u201cHe lived a long life before he died, with his only daughter still in prison,\u201d Hunt said, tears rolling down his face. \u201cHe could not see her one last time.\u201d\n\nWells put his arm around Hunt while wiping off his own tears.\n\nHis deepest hope is to \u201cbring them home alive, and bring them home this year,\u201d Wells said.\n\n\u2018Can\u2019t Delay It Further\u2019\n\nMore than 200 Americans are currently detained in China, according to the Dui Hua Foundation, a human rights group focused on the country.\n\nThe Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has also heavily suppressed religious and ethnic minority groups, such as Uyghurs, Christians, and practitioners of the spiritual practice Falun Gong, subjecting them to arbitrary arrests, harsh sentences, and other forms of abuse.\n\nThose imprisoned include many who have families in America.\n\nRushan Abbas, executive director at Campaign for Uyghurs, described the case of her sister, Gulshan Abbas, as an example of the CCP\u2019s transnational repression.\n\nGulshan Abbas disappeared days after Rushan Abbas spoke in public about the mass detention and torture of Uyghurs in China\u2019s Xinjiang region. The former was sentenced to 20 years in prison in a secret trial.\n\n\u201cBehind every statistic is a human being, a family torn apart, and a voice the CCP is trying to silence,\u201d Rushan Abbas said.\n\nErping Zhang, a spokesperson for Falun Gong, noted the case of Alisa Zhou, a Maryland accountant in the audience whose mother has been detained in China since April.\n\nHer mother\u2019s arrest followed months of covert Chinese police surveillance of two Falun Gong study groups, Zhang noted in his written testimony.\n\nAmerican Grace Chen, who\u2019s in the U.S. Army, was a teenager when the Chinese authorities arrested her parents in 2020. Only after their release in 2025 did Chen learn about the \u201chorrors\u201d that her father experienced, Zhang said at the hearing. Chen\u2019s father was denied sleep, scalded with hot water, and forced to drink urine, according to Zhang.\n\nHer parents are still in China.\n\nTrump in July helped Pastor Ezra Jin of Beijing\u2019s Zion Church gain his freedom. Jin also testified at the hearing, with his daughter, Grace Jin Drexel, as the translator.\n\nHe said later in an interview that he considers the upcoming meeting between Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping to be the best shot to raise the political prisoners\u2019 case.\n\n\u201cWe can\u2019t delay it further,\u201d Jin said. He added that he hopes the freedom he enjoys can soon extend to many others who still don\u2019t have it\u2014including eight church fellows arrested at the same time as him in October 2025 and two Light of Zion Church leaders, Gao Quanfu and his wife, Pang Yu.\n\nWells has about 10 minutes of call time with his jailed son each month. He has saved this month\u2019s allotment for after the summit, hoping to deliver some good news, he told The Epoch Times.\n\nHunt said he is cautiously hopeful. Speaking slowly at the hearing, he told the audience that if his sister and Wells\u2019s son can\u2019t come home at the same time, he hopes that Wells\u2019s son gets the priority.\n\n\u201cHe still has a mother and a father that are alive. He still has that family that can support him. He needs that,\u201d Hunt said.", 1, "2026-09-25T10:04:52Z", "2026-09-25T10:05:46Z"]], "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=415867"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.2293271720409393, "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"}