Imprisoned Hong Kong activist Jimmy Lai honored with 2025 Bradley Prize

 

CNA Staff, May 30, 2025 / 14:40 pm (CNA).

Jimmy Lai, the imprisoned pro-democracy advocate and Hong Kong entrepreneur, is the honorary recipient of the 2025 Bradley Prize for his unwavering commitment to free speech, democracy, and journalistic integrity.

His son, Sebastien Lai, accepted the award on his father’s behalf at a ceremony in Washington, D.C., on Thursday. The Bradley Prize recognizes Lai’s role as a Catholic human rights activist standing against one of the world’s most oppressive regimes.

Imprisoned for over four years and currently in solitary confinement, Lai, 77, faces potential life imprisonment under Beijing’s 2020 national security law, which has stifled dissent and suppressed free speech in Hong Kong.

“Jimmy’s extraordinary courage and deeply held beliefs in journalistic integrity, human dignity, and democracy are an inspiration to all who value freedom,” said Rick Graber, president of The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation. “His sacrifice serves as a beacon of hope for those fighting against tyranny, and we are proud to award him with an honorary Bradley Prize.”

Lai, the founder of the now-shuttered pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, has become a global symbol of resistance against what Graber described as the “oppressive, authoritarian rule” of the Chinese Communist Party.

The former stowaway and child factory worker turned billionaire’s entrepreneurial ventures spanned digital media and retail apparel, but it was his outspoken criticism of the Chinese government’s tightening grip on freedom and democracy in Hong Kong that led to his multiple arrests.

Sebastien Lai told EWTN’s Raymond Arroyo on “The World Over with Raymond Arroyo” on Thursday that he and his family are worried about his father, a diabetic with little to no access to medical care, the sacraments, or natural light in his “more than 1,600 days” in solitary confinement.

“It’s just cruelty what they’re doing to him” in prison, Sebastien said, “and he needs to be released immediately.”

President Donald Trump has said he would include Jimmy Lai’s release as part of ongoing negotiations with China. Sebastien met with members of the Trump administration in March, telling Arroyo he is “hopeful” and is grateful for the president’s “moral clarity” regarding his father’s case.

Though the elder Lai is a British citizen and could have fled, he chose to remain in Hong Kong, advocating for his principles. Sebastien said he has not yet met with Prime Minister Keir Starmer but he is hopeful the British government will help bring about his father’s release.

The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, based in Milwaukee, established the Bradley Prize in 2004 to honor individuals whose work strengthens the principles of American exceptionalism, limited government, free markets, and civil society. Each recipient receives a $250,000 to $300,000 stipend for contributions in areas such as constitutional order, education, and cultural vitality.

Past recipients include economist Thomas Sowell; journalists William Kristol and Charles Krauthammer; Robert P. George; and Mary Ann Glendon, the Harvard Law School professor emeritus who also served as the first woman president of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.

Sebastien asked EWTN viewers to write to their elected representatives in Washington asking for Jimmy’s release and to “say a little prayer and light a candle” for his freedom. He expressed hope that Pope Leo XIV, who asked for prayers for the people in China this past Sunday, would also call for Jimmy Lai’s release.

“It is such a clear case of a persecuted Christian,” Sebastien said of his father’s imprisonment. The pope’s support of Lai “would give the people in China hope. It would definitely give my father hope.”

He said his father’s faith is his “pillar,” and although he is physically weak, he is “spiritually and intellectually” strong. “He knows he is doing the right thing by God.”

The Chinese government wants his father to think that “he’s fighting by himself in his little cell,” Lai said. “But he’s not. He’s fighting for everybody’s freedom.”

“A man’s courage to give up everything he has to fight for what is right reverberates through time,” he said.