(NewsNation) — President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping are meeting in San Francisco, and one hot-button issue some U.S. lawmakers have been pressing Biden to raise is the wrongful detention of Mark Swidan.
He's the Texan on death row in China, arrested in 2012 on drug-related charges despite no evidence he committed any crime. In April, a Chinese court denied his appeal and upheld his death sentence.
Mark's mother, Katherine Swidan, says she has "hope" but is "not really confident" that the presidents will discuss the case, which she says should serve as a warning for other businessman like Swidan.
"I'm hoping at least Biden raises his name," Swidan said Wednesday on "Elizabeth Vargas Reports." "This is a trade meeting, APEC is full of CEOs, and they should be comfortable going and trading and working with China just like a long time ago, and as long as as people know that they're in danger of being detained or there's an exit ban where they can't leave or their companies are gonna be jeopardy, they're not going to be able to do any trade."
In 2012, Mark Swidan traveled from Texas to China to buy materials to remodel his home. He was arrested on accusations of trafficking and manufacturing methamphetamine, but U.S. leaders have argued Swidan was not in China at the time of the alleged crime. The United Nations says Swidan was arbitrarily detained.
Katherine Swidan has been pushing for the release of her son for years and said ahead of the Biden-Xi meeting that Biden is "doing nothing" to help wrongfully detained people in China.
She also previously told NewsNation she feels like she's "in the dark" on what is being done to secure her son's release.
Swidan said Wednesday the last time she spoke to her son was in 2018 for about five minutes. Letters she's received from him have revealed some details about the conditions of the prison he is in.
"They had broken his hands five to seven times, they had interrogated him for many many days, beating him, I don't know what else ... but they were they were torturing him trying to get a video saying he renounced the United States," Swidan said. "He's been tortured ever since then, humiliated, he's been very sick, he's lost over a hundred pounds."
Jason Poblete, a lawyer for Mark Swidan, told NewsNation in April his client was being treated like a political prisoner.
Katherine Swidan says Biden has never spoken to her directly about the case, but if she could send Xi a message, it would be this:
"To let Mark go after all this time would be gracious of you, and it would also let the world know that hostage is not just a word, that this man doesn't deserve to be there," she said. "Mark needs to come home. My baby, my best friend."