Donald Trump has acknowledged that he is not optimistic about securing the release of the jailed Hong Kong media magnate Jimmy Lai, after raising the case directly with China’s leader during his visit to Beijing. Speaking aboard Air Force One on his return flight, the US president disclosed that Xi Jinping had described Lai’s situation as “a tough one”, and that the reaction to his entreaties was “not positive”. Lai, a 78-year-old British citizen and former proprietor of the pro-democracy Apple Daily, was sentenced to 20 years in prison in February under the national security law Beijing imposed on the territory. His legal team has warned that his health is deteriorating, fuelling fears he may die behind bars.

Lai emerged as one of the most visible figures in Hong Kong’s democracy movement long before the 2019 anti-government protests that spurred Beijing to tighten its grip. His newspaper, Apple Daily, was a strident critic of the city’s executive and of mainland policy, and its closure in 2021 marked a watershed in the crackdown. Arrested in 2020, Lai was convicted of collusion with foreign forces and conspiracy to subvert state power — charges that drew widespread international condemnation, particularly from Britain, which holds him as a citizen of the former colonial power.

Viewed from Washington, the episode underscores the limits of presidential diplomacy on matters of core Chinese sovereignty. Trump, who has sought to project a transactional relationship with Beijing, found no room for manoeuvre on a case that Xi considers a domestic legal and political matter. Analysts in London note that Lai’s British nationality has not shielded him from a justice system that operates under Beijing’s directive, and that the UK government’s repeated calls for his release have been ignored. Tellingly, Trump also indicated that Xi may be more willing to consider the release of a detained American church pastor — a hint that Beijing distinguishes sharply between cases involving foreign citizens and those it views as threats to internal security.

The outcome is a sobering signal for those who hoped a US-China rapprochement might produce humanitarian concessions. Lai’s case has become a symbolic test of whether Xi’s regime is prepared to show clemency, but the president’s blunt dismissal of Trump’s request suggests no such flexibility is forthcoming. With Lai’s health worsening and the political climate in Hong Kong remaining tightly controlled, the prospects for his early release appear to rest less on external pressure than on a calculus in Beijing that has, for now, no interest in yielding.