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Hong Kong activist Nathan Law to attend Trump’s State of the Union address
- US Senator Rick Scott invited Law as a signal that Congress’s interest in the Hong Kong protests has not faded
- ‘Nathan is an inspiration in the fight for freedom and democracy,’ said Scott, a Republican from Florida
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When US President Donald Trump makes his annual State of the Union address to Congress on Tuesday evening, the Hong Kong activist Nathan Law Kwun-chung will be in attendance – the guest of Senator Rick Scott, Republican of Florida.
Scott views the invitation as a way to keep Hong Kong’s continuing protest movement and its struggle for democracy front and centre as a foreign policy issue for the US.
“I am honoured to have Nathan as my guest,” Scott said. “Nathan is an inspiration in the fight for freedom and democracy, and he has sent a powerful message to Communist China that the people of Hong Kong will not back down or be silenced.”
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Later on Monday in another move likely to displease Beijing, fellow Florida Republican Senator Mark Rubio said he would host Uygur human rights activist Rushan Abbas at the president's speech.
"As the founder and executive director of Campaign for Uygurs, Rushan has tirelessly raised awareness of the atrocities taking place in Xinjiang at the hands of the Chinese Communist Party." Rubio said.
Law, the founding chairman of youth activist group Demosistō, was unseated as a Hong Kong legislator in 2017 and is now a graduate student in East Asian Studies at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. He confirmed in a tweet that he plans to attend.
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