Chinese national Xinyue Lou is on trial this week, facing criminal charges for conspiracy after being accused of illegally funneling money to President Donald Trump for his 2020 re-election bid.

According to a Tuesday report from The New York Times, he did so in part for a photo with Trump — and was ultimately denied the opportunity because he was “not American.”

A Chinese American businessman, Lou had contributed nearly $100,000 to Trump’s re-election bid since 2016, and in 2019 made an agreement with Trump’s fundraising committee that, were he to raise $25,000, he’d receive two V.I.P. tickets to a Trump fundraising event and the chance for a photo with the president himself, prosecutors said.

An article published in the Chinese edition of the far-right news outlet The Epoch Times shows that Lou had already scored a photo with Trump at a prior event, but apparently was seeking a second photo opportunity with the president.

Lou was successful in raising the $25,000, though was forced to funnel the funds through others given that he, as a Chinese national, was ineligible to contribute to Trump’s campaign efforts, prosecutors allege.

Tickets in hand, Lou would go on to attend the fundraising event, but by the end of the night was snubbed in his hopes to secure a photo with Trump.

“He was told by the fund-raising committee that the Chinese nationals on his guest list could not take a photo with Mr. Trump, because they were not American, prosecutors said,” wrote New York Times reporter Santul Nerkar, who covers federal courts in Brooklyn.

“He expressed his disappointment, saying he had ‘made so much effort to raise the funds.’ ‘Well, a rule is a rule and I am happy to respect and follow it,’ Mr. Lou wrote back over email, according to prosecutors.”

Lou would later be informed he was under investigation in 2020, and in March of 2024, he was officially charged by the Biden administration’s Justice Department. Now, Lou is pushing back against his prosecution, alleging himself to be the victim of political prosecution, and that he was targeted for his support of Trump.

Prosecutors, however, aren’t buying Lou’s defense.

“There is absolutely no evidence that the defendant was selectively prosecuted,” they wrote, according to The New York Times.