(Minghui.org) US President Donald Trump and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping held formal talks at the White House on September 24. On the same day, Falun Gong practitioners held a rally in front of the Navy Memorial located between the White House and the Capitol Building, calling for an end to the persecution of Falun Gong by the CCP.

More than 20 guests spoke at the event, including New York Democratic Congressman Pat Ryan, Professor Robert Destro (former Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor), Nina Shea (Director of the Center for Religious Freedom at the Hudson Institute), David Trimble (President of the Religious Freedom Institute), Dr. Bradley Thayer (Director of China Policy at the Center for Security Policy), and persecution survivors. They called on the CCP to stop persecuting Falun Gong and immediately end its killing of Falun Gong practitioners for organs.

Falun Gong practitioners hold a rally in front of the Navy Memorial, located between the White House and the Capitol Building, on September 24, 2026. (Minghui.org)

Congressman: Protecting Falun Gong From the CCP’s Persecution Is a Bipartisan Consensus

US Representative Pat Ryan, a Democrat from New York, remarked, “My own constituents have had their literal bodies mutilated and ripped apart as part of this systemic practice of organ harvesting, one of the many egregious violations of human rights and human dignity. We know the CCP has been carrying on this for decades, it is well documented, and that continues despite all the work of everyone here.”

US Representative Pat Ryan speaks at the rally. (Minghui.org)

“I just want everyone to know that in the United States Congress, a half mile from here, there is and remains bipartisan support for religious freedom, specifically to protect the practices of the Falun Gong,” Rep. Ryan continued. “I am the proud co-sponsor of the Falun Gong Protection Act, bipartisan legislation which we have passed through the United States House of Representatives with wide, strong support, signifying that the American people stand with and support the Falun Gong people in every dimension of your faith and your freedom.”

Rep. Ryan said he would continue to push for this legislation as he had done in the past. Although some people had not spoken out strongly enough, he said he would stand in solidarity with Falun Gong practitioners and defend their freedom as well as the freedom of every American.

Think Tank Scholar: I Have Stood Firmly With Falun Gong for Decades

Nina Shea, director and senior fellow at the Center for Religious Freedom at the Hudson Institute, a prominent Washington-based think tank, has been appointed seven times by the US Congress to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).

She said at the rally, “I’m very proud to be here. I have stood with solidarity with Falun Gong for many years, in fact, over several decades now. It’s a cooler day than most of them. So, I'm very proud and honored to be here in support.”

Nina Shea, director of the Center for Religious Freedom at the Hudson Institute, speaks at the rally. (Minghui.org)

Shea said she was happy to tell everyone that a new wave has emerged—a movement to support Falun Gong and other persecuted religious believers in China. Nonetheless, the CCP has continued conducting religious persecution through a variety of oppressive and cruel measures.

“Some are bloody and primitive, from the ‘tiger bench’ torture to gang rape to forced sterilizations and forced organ harvesting, especially against Falun Gong practitioners,” she said. “This ranges from political trials to indefinite detentions. Falun Gong has documented over 5,000 practitioners killed in China because of practicing Falun Gong.”

Commenting on the CCP’s transnational repression on US soil, Shea said, “This is a threat to our own freedoms. It’s not just a matter of what’s going on in China. The United States policy must be comprehensive in addressing it.”

Former Assistant Secretary of State: Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance Should Guide US Foreign Policy

Robert Destro is a former US Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor and current law professor at the Catholic University of America. “I would really like to thank the Falun Gong practitioners for their heart, for their commitment, and for their vision of a good China—a China that is open and accessible to all the people who live there,” he remarked.

Robert Destro, former Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor and professor of law at the Catholic University of America (Minghui.org)

“I’d like to direct your attention right behind me to the sign that points out Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance. That is a great set of principles, and it should guide the way in which America does its foreign policy,” he continued.

Destro believes China is not our enemy. “But the CCP is in fact a parasite on the body of China,” he added. “And so, as I look behind me at the banners and see Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance, those are great words—not simply for how you get along with each other, but for how countries get along with one another.”

President of the Religious Freedom Institute: Stop the Persecution of Falun Gong Immediately

David Trimble, president of the Religious Freedom Institute (RFI), called on CCP leader Xi Jinping to immediately stop the persecution and demanded an immediate halt to forced organ harvesting.

“Today we stand in solidarity with the Falun Gong, and we call upon Xi Jinping to end that persecution immediately… the immediate end of forced human harvesting. We should end it, and we should end it now,” he said.

                                
           David Trimble, president of the Religious Freedom Institute, speaks at the rally. (Minghui.org)

Trimble stated that religious freedom is a principle without borders. Citing groups such as Christians, Muslims, Yazidis, Tibetan Buddhists, and Falun Gong practitioners, he pointed out that people of different faiths share common human dignity and should enjoy the freedom to live according to their beliefs. He said that leaders in the United States and around the world should stand together against the perpetrators of religious persecution.

In response to the view that religious freedom should give way to issues such as the economy and national security, Trimble said, “Our founders understood and placed in our First Amendment this basic human right, because in fact it stands at the center of freedom. It stands as an anchor to stability, an anchor of international relations and as an anchor of national security. This conversation can never be marginalized. It must be prioritized.”

Congressional Candidate: Stop the Persecution and Release Falun Gong Practitioners

Republican candidate Dave Wallace of Maryland’s 2nd Congressional District spoke at the rally and called for an end to the persecution. He urged the Chinese regime to release Falun Gong practitioners who are imprisoned simply for their peaceful beliefs.

There are serious and horrifying allegations that prisoners of conscience—including Falun Gong practitioners—have suffered the atrocity of forced organ harvesting, Wallace said, adding that a perfectly healthy person is not a collection of “spare parts” and that a person cannot be treated as an organ bank.

When an innocent person is chosen, scheduled, murdered, and has their organs harvested, simply to provide vital organs to an unsuspecting recipient, it is utterly outrageous, Wallace said. “It is a blatant trampling on the very idea of the ‘sanctity of life’ that we cherish. This practice must stop.”

Wallace said he would call on the United States to ban transplant tourism that involves obtaining organs through coercion, trafficking, execution, or murder of prisoners of conscience. No American should be allowed to buy another person’s life, he added.

Wallace concluded by calling on the Chinese regime to release Falun Gong practitioners and other prisoners of conscience and allow people to meditate without fear. He said it is important to recognize the inherent dignity of every person and the life given to them by God.

Human Rights Activist: Falun Gong Practitioners Are Strong and Kind

Suzanne Scholte, president of the Defense Forum Foundation (DFF), recalled at the rally that she first learned about Falun Gong from a South Korean Christian pastor and North Korean refugees held in Chinese detention centers. They told her that they had seen Falun Gong practitioners being persecuted in those centers—housewives, students—and that they were very kind people.

Suzanne Scholte, Chair of the Defense Forum Foundation (Minghui.org)

Scholte also said that Shen Yun, a “beautiful organization that does an incredibly powerful tribute to preserve the beauty of Chinese culture and the history of China ... has also been persecuted” by the CCP.

Scholte concluded by saying, “I know that we will eventually win this battle because all dictatorships die, and the solution to all the suffering is the end of this communist dictatorship.”

Member of the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China (ETAC): We Must Take Action

Louisa Greve, a member of the International Advisory Committee of the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China (ETAC), said in her speech that a detailed record of research over the past 25 years shows that Falun Gong practitioners have suffered greatly and become victims of profit-driven murder over the past 27 years. Their organs have been forcibly harvested to support China’s growing transplant industry, she said.

Louisa Greve, a member of the International Advisory Committee of the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China (ETAC) (Minghui.org)

Greve said federal and state legislatures need to act to stop Americans from becoming complicit in these crimes. Example bills include the Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act (HR 1503) and the Block Organ Transplant Purchases from China Act (HR 2114). She said the House also needs to prohibit Medicare, Medicaid, and private health insurance plans from covering the costs of illicit organ transplants.

Global Service Center for Quitting the CCP: “Speak Out for Truth, Conscience, and the Future of Humanity”

Wang Zhiyuan, chairman of the Global Service Center for Quitting the CCP, said that Falun Gong practitioners standing in Washington, DC today are “not only speaking out for Falun Gong practitioners who are being persecuted, but also for the truth, for conscience, and for the future of humanity.

“The CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong is pushing China into an abyss of disaster; the CCP’s transnational persecution is also bringing evil into the United States and into every free society,” Wang explained. “This persecution has never only harmed Falun Gong. When a regime arrests, tortures, and even takes the lives of people simply because they believe in Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, it destroys the law, morality, and human dignity of the entire society.”

Chen Peiming, a survivor of the CCP’s forced organ harvesting and a victim of the regime’s transnational repression of Falun Gong, said in his speech, “Part of my lungs and part of my liver were forcibly removed, leaving a 35-centimeter-long scar.

“No matter how painful it is, I will live on to expose the CCP’s forced organ harvesting,” he said. “Forced organ harvesting is an evil, the greatest evil of mankind. Thank you to kind friends for uniting to stop the forced organ harvesting and jointly defend human life and dignity.”