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It’s Wednesday, September 23. This is The Front Page, your daily window into the world of The Free Press—and our take on the world at large. Today: Aaron MacLean glimpses the future of war in the Baltics. Maya Sulkin reports on the union that’s “dismantling oppression,” unless you’re Jewish. Allison Schrager asks: What happened to our frontier spirit? All that and much more.

But first: the Xi-Trump meeting, and Pastor Ezra Jin’s message to the world leaders.

Today, Chinese President Xi Jinping will land in Washington, D.C., for a meeting with President Donald Trump.

On the agenda will be some of the most important issues of our time: artificial intelligence, critical minerals, trade, and Taiwan.

But many are hoping one critical issue won’t be left off: human rights. Particularly, the cases of political prisoners still being held behind bars in China for the crimes of advocating for democracy and practicing their faith.

When the two leaders met in May, President Trump raised a case I had been following closely for months: the detention of Chinese pastor Ezra Jin. I wrote about his imprisonment, and the Chinese Communist Party’s long war on his Zion Church, in my investigation for The Free Press earlier this year, “China vs. God.”

After the meeting, Trump said he was hopeful Jin would be released, and two months later, that’s exactly what happened. But Jin was not the only member of his church who was detained by Chinese authorities. And while he is now free, and reunited with his family in the United States, eight of his colleagues remain in Chinese prison. So, too, are other prisoners of conscience, including Hong Kong democracy activist Jimmy Lai.

Today, Pastor Jin writes in our pages that this week’s meeting between the leaders of the world’s two largest powers is “a unique opportunity” to free the members of his church still behind bars, and “begin a new chapter for China’s Christians.”

If his freedom is any indication, sometimes miracles are possible.

—Frannie Block

Ezra Jin • International Pastor Ezra Jin: Free My Fellow Church Leaders in China

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Maya Sulkin • Antisemitism

This Union Is ‘Committed to Dismantling Oppression,’ Unless You’re Jewish

Cal State’s faculty union has groups for black, Latino, and Muslim members. But when Jewish faculty tabled a motion to form one of their own earlier this month, the proposal was denounced as a “Zionist, right-wing, settler-colonialist project.” Maya Sulkin has the story on what happened, and why, for once-loyal Jewish members of the union, this was the final straw. Read story ›

Aaron MacLean • International

Drones and Satellites: The Baltics Prepare for War with Russia

If you want to see the future of war, go to Eastern Europe. In Ukraine, cutting-edge technology is being experimented with on the battlefield, and to the north, in the Baltics, NATO members braced for a Russian attack hope new weapons will tilt the odds in their favor. Aaron MacLean reports from Lithuania on the Europeans preparing to defend their countries—and the tools that could help them win. Read story ›

Allison Schrager • Culture and Ideas

Whatever Happened to America’s Frontier Spirit?

At around 80 years old, Kenneth Deardorff lives in a small cabin in McGrath, Alaska; his humble home holds a special place in American history. In 1988, the government awarded Deardorff his land with the last-ever Homestead Act patent. That deed “marked not only the official closing of the American frontier,” writes Allison Schrager, “but a radical shift in our relationship with risk.” Today, she explains how our culture lost the courage to venture into the unknown—and how we might reclaim our appetite for risk. Read story ›

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