Anti-ICE Activists Storm Minnesota Church With Don Lemon; DOJ Launches Probe

[ad_1] The Division of Justice is investigating after a gaggle of activists and ex-CNN host Don Lemon disrupted a church service in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Sunday.

Dozens of protesters crowded into Cities Church in St. Paul on Sunday as a part of a “clandestine operation” to “disrupt enterprise as regular,” activist chief Nekima Levy-Armstrong informed Lemon, who embedded with the protest group. The protest lasted roughly half-hour and successfully ended the church service because it drove congregants out.

Lemon interviewed Levy-Armstrong forward of “Operation Pullup,” because the protest was known as, and adopted agitators to Cities Church, conducting interviews, and, at occasions, arguing with members of the church and defending the “free speech” of the protesters, evaluating the church invasion to the civil rights motion.

Agitators aren’t simply focusing on our officers. Now they’re focusing on church buildings, too.

They’re going from lodge to lodge, church to church, looking for federal regulation enforcement who're risking their lives to guard People.

Tim Walz and Jacob Frey are accountable for whipping… https://t.co/O3WQ6Iftfe

— U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (@ICEgov) January 18, 2026

Clips from Lemon’s protection of the protest unfold on social media and drew the eye of Assistant Legal professional Common Harmeet Dhillon, who heads the Division of Justice’s Civil Rights Division.

“The [Civil Rights Division] is investigating the potential violations of the federal FACE Act by these folks desecrating a home of worship and interfering with Christian worshippers,” Dhillon mentioned in a publish on X.

The Freedom of Entry to Clinic Entrances Act, or FACE Act, “prohibits the use or menace of drive and bodily obstruction that injures, intimidates, or interferes with an individual looking for to acquire or present reproductive well being companies or to train the First Modification proper of non secular freedom at a spot of non secular worship,” based on the Justice Division .

Dhillon later steered that Lemon is a goal of the investigation as nicely, and may very well be prosecuted for his function within the protest.

“A home of worship isn't a public discussion board in your protest! It's a house shielded from precisely such acts by federal prison and civil legal guidelines! Nor does the First Modification defend your pseudo journalism of disrupting a prayer service. You're on discover!” Dhillon mentioned .

White Home Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt additionally responded to the incident on X:

President Trump is not going to tolerate the intimidation and harassment of Christians of their sacred locations of worship.

The Division of Justice has launched a full investigation into the despicable incident that happened earlier as we speak at a church in Minnesota.

— Karoline Leavitt (@PressSec) January 19, 2026

The protest was organized and promoted by the Racial Justice Community and Black Lives Matter Minnesota. Cities Church was focused by the activists as a result of, Levy-Armstrong claimed, certainly one of its pastors works for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

“They can not faux to be a home of God whereas harboring somebody who's directing ICE brokers to wreak havoc upon our group,” Levy-Armstrong informed Lemon. “I'm a reverend on prime of being a lawyer and an activist, so I come right here within the energy of the almighty God for righteousness, fact, and justice.”

On Lemon’s stream of the protest, Levy-Armstrong led dozens of protesters into the church throughout companies, crowding the aisle and chanting slogans reminiscent of “justice for Renee Good,” “fingers up, don’t shoot,” and “ICE out of Minnesota.” As protesters chanted, Lemon monologued in regards to the significance of the First Modification, talking out towards perceived injustice, and the which means of protesting.

“That is the start of what’s going to occur right here. If you violate folks’s due course of, if you pull folks off the road, you begin dragging them and hurting them and never abiding by the Structure – if you begin doing all of that, folks get upset and indignant,” Lemon mentioned as protesters shouted on the assembled church-goers ready for the chaos to finish.

Lemon in contrast the protest to the civil rights motion and asserted that the protesters’ actions have been protected beneath the Structure.

“There may be nothing within the Structure that tells you what time you may protest. You'll be able to protest at any time. That’s the entire level of it, to disrupt, to make uncomfortable. And that’s what they’re doing,” Lemon mentioned. “If you see how uncomfortable folks, uncomfortably and harsh individuals are being handled on the streets, it's important to be keen to enter locations and disrupt and make folks uncomfortable. That's what this nation is about.”

Lemon at one level notes a “younger man” within the nook of the church who Lemon says is “scared” and “crying.” The previous CNN host turned YouTuber later states, “It’s uncomfortable and traumatic for the folks right here … however that’s what protesting is about.”

At one level in the course of the protest, Lemon spoke to the church’s lead pastor, Jonathan Parnell. Parnell was not the pastor accused by protesters of working for ICE.

“It’s shameful to interrupt a public gathering of christians in worship,” Parnell informed Lemon.

Lemon challenged the pastor, asserting that the Structure and First Modification defend the “freedom of speech and freedom to assemble and protest.”

“We're right here to worship. We're right here to worship Jesus as a result of that's the hope of those cities, that’s the hope of the world is Jesus Christ, okay?” Parnell responded earlier than leaving the interview quickly after.