{"id":28715,"date":"2026-05-17T11:54:46","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T11:54:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/?p=28715"},"modified":"2026-05-17T11:54:46","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T11:54:46","slug":"what-xi-said-to-trump-about-imprisoned-christians-in-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/?p=28715","title":{"rendered":"What Xi Said to Trump About Imprisoned Christians in China"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Reading Time:<\/span> 2<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

President Donald Trump said Chinese leader Xi Jinping is hesitant to release imprisoned Christian Jimmy Lai, a pro-democracy newspaper publisher.\n<\/p>\n

Pray for your fellow intercessor.<\/h4>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Trump told reporters he spoke with Xi during the Beijing state visit about imprisoned Christian Pastor Ezra Jin and said Xi was \u201cgiving very serious consideration\u201d to his release.\n<\/p>\n

Jin, the pastor of Zion Church, which was founded in Beijing, was detained in November 2025. He is one of 18 members of the church who are currently imprisoned in China, his daughter said.\n<\/p>\n

But the president expressed less confidence about the release of Lai.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI discussed Jimmy,\u201d Trump said. \u201cIt\u2019s a tougher one. I did bring it up. It\u2019s a tough one. For him it\u2019s a tougher one.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Jimmy Lai is a Hong Kong businessman who founded the pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily.\n<\/p>\n

\u201c[Xi] told me, and I don\u2019t want to mislead anybody,\u201d Trump said. \u201cHe said Jimmy Lai is a tough one for him. He went through a lot, right or wrong, went through a lot. So, he told me that would be a tough one. He said he\u2019s going to strongly consider the pastor.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

In February, 78-year-old Lai was sentenced to 20 years in prison, meaning he will probably die in jail if he is not released. He was convicted in December on two counts of conspiring to collude with foreign forces and a charge of conspiracy to publish seditious materials.\n<\/p>\n

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has condemned Lai\u2019s sentence.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Hong Kong High Court\u2019s decision to sentence Jimmy Lai to 20 years is an unjust and tragic conclusion to this case,\u201d Rubio said in a statement.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIt shows the world that Beijing will go to extraordinary lengths to silence those who advocate fundamental freedoms in Hong Kong, casting aside the international commitments Beijing made in the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration,\u201d he added.\n<\/p>\n

Rubio also urged authorities to grant Lai humanitarian parole, arguing that Lai and his family \u201chave suffered enough.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Leading up to Trump\u2019s visit to Beijing, Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., and Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., led 105 members of Congress in penning a letter urging Trump to fight for \u201cJimmy Lai\u2019s full and unconditional release when meeting with President Xi at the upcoming summit.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Scott praised Trump for \u201cdoing everything he can to get Jimmy Lai free.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes doing the right things means having to negotiate with an absolutely despicable dictator like Xi,\u201d Scott told The Daily Signal. \u201cJimmy is 78, diabetic, and is suffering in solitary confinement only because he believes in freedom. We can\u2019t give up. I\u2019m going to keep fighting for Jimmy\u2019s release no matter what it takes.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Share your prayers and scriptures for these imprisoned believers below.<\/h4>\n

This article was originally published at The Daily Signal. Photo Credit: Official White House Photo by Daniel Torok.<\/em>
\n \n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reading Time: 2 minutes President Donald Trump said Chinese leader Xi Jinping is hesitant to release imprisoned Christian Jimmy Lai, a pro-democracy newspaper publisher. Pray for your fellow intercessor. \u00a0 Trump told reporters he spoke with Xi during the Beijing state visit about imprisoned Christian Pastor Ezra Jin and said Xi was \u201cgiving very serious<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28716,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[2814,119,2047,174],"class_list":{"0":"post-28715","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-prayer","8":"tag-china","9":"tag-christians","10":"tag-imprisoned","11":"tag-trump"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28715"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28715\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28716"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}