street. PAUL, MINNESOTA — Don Lemon, the former CNN host turned freelance journalist, is scheduled to be arraigned in federal court in Minnesota on Friday along with four other defendants charged for their alleged roles in disrupting a church service where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement official was the pastor.
Also scheduled to be arraigned on Friday is civil rights lawyer Nikema Levy Armstrong, the subject of a photo posted on an official White House social media account that was edited to falsely show her crying when she was arrested. The image is part of a deluge of AI-altered images that have circulated since the killings of Rene Judd and Alex Peretti by federal officers in Minneapolis amid the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration.
Summons in federal court typically involve filing motions and scheduling future proceedings. It was not clear before the hearing whether Lemon planned to appear in person or allow his legal team to handle the hearing. His attorney, Joe Thompson, did not return calls seeking comment this week.
Other defendants, including independent journalist Georgia Forte, are scheduled to be arraigned next week. A total of nine accused are charged in this case.
Lemon had previously said through another attorney, Marlene Bednarsk, that he planned to plead not guilty to federal civil rights charges over his coverage of the protest at the Southern Baptist Church in St. Paul.
Protesters interrupted the service at Cities Church on Jan. 18 by chanting “ICE out” and “Justice for Renee Good,” a reference to the 37-year-old mother of three who was fatally shot by an ICE officer in Minneapolis last month. Lemon said he was not affiliated with the group and that he was there as a journalist to cover the event for his live show.
“I have spent my entire career covering the news,” Lemon told reporters after his arrest. “I will not stop now. In fact, there is no more important time than now, this very moment for a free and independent media that shines a light on the truth and holds those in power accountable.”
The church protest sparked sharp complaints from conservative religious and political leaders. White House press secretary Carolyn Leavitt warned in a social media post at the time that “President Trump will not tolerate the intimidation and harassment of Christians in their sacred places of worship.” Even among clergy who oppose the administration’s immigration enforcement tactics, there has been unease with such protests.
The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act of 1994 prohibits interfering with or intimidating “any person by force or threat of force or physical obstruction who exercises or seeks to exercise the First Amendment right to religious freedom in a place of religious worship.” Penalties can reach up to one year in prison and a fine of up to $10,000.
Thompson is one of several former prosecutors who have left the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office in recent weeks amid frustration with the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration enforcement in the state and the Justice Department’s response to the shootings of Judd and Peretti.
Thompson, one of four attorneys on record to represent Lemon in the future, had been leading the expanding investigation into major fraud cases in the office’s public programs until his resignation last month. The Trump administration has cited fraud cases, in which most of the defendants come from the state’s large Somali community, as justification for its immigration crackdown.
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