Ex-CNN talking head Don Lemon joined other radicals in storming a Christian church on Sunday in Saint Paul, Minnesota.
The White House and the Department of Justice indicated that those who disrupted the service, intimidated churchgoers, and screamed incessantly at the altar about Renee Good — a subversive who died driving her SUV into a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent — may soon face a reckoning.
Rushing the altar
Radicals from Racial Justice Network, Black Lives Matter Minnesota, and BLM Twin Cities assembled on Sunday for a so-called “ICE Out Action.” Rather than interfere with ICE operations like the woman whose name was on their lips, they rushed into Cities Church and did their best to drown out sounds of worship.
‘A house of worship is not a public forum for your protest!’
Nekima Levy Armstrong, founder of the Racial Justice Network and former president of the Minneapolis chapter of the NAACP, claimed responsibility for the disruption and indicated that Cities Church was targeted because “David Easterwood is a Pastor at this church and the Acting Field Director for the ICE office in St. Paul.”
Footage from an October Department of Homeland Security press conference appears to feature the same David Easterwood who is pictured on the church’s website. Blaze News has reached out to ICE and Cities Church for comment.
“It’s time for judgment to begin,” said Armstrong.
The mob refused requests from church officials to leave the premises and instead screamed and chanted in the aisles and pews.
In one video of the mob action, Armstrong yells, “Someone who claims to worship God, teaching people in this church about God, is out there overseeing ICE agents. Think about what we experienced. The murder of Renee Good at the hands of ICE. A Venezuelan national shot by ICE.”
RELATED: Don Lemon calls for ‘black people, brown people’ to take up arms against ICE
Photo by Arturo Holmes/Getty Images
After alluding to two individuals who were shot, one fatally, while allegedly attacking federal agents, Armstrong yelled, “How dare you claim to be a pastor of God? … You are involved in evil in our community.”
In another potentially incriminating video that BLM Minnesota shared online, radicals can be seen blocking the altar, yelling Renee Good’s name, and pressing parishioners individually to answer whether they support ICE. One pair of visibly upset churchgoers can be seen in the video comforting one another while the radicals angrily condemn members of law enforcement.
Don Lemon, posing as a journalist on the scene, advocated for the mob action, stating, “There’s nothing in the Constitution that tells you what time you can protest. You can protest at any time. That’s the whole point of it — is to disrupt, is to make uncomfortable, and that’s what they’re doing, and that’s what I believe when I say everyone has to be willing to sacrifice something. You have to make people uncomfortable in these times.”
Lemon — who suggested in October that “black people, brown people” should take up arms against ICE — lectured lead Pastor Jonathan Parnell after Parnell said the mob action was “unacceptable” and that it was “shameful to interrupt a public gathering of Christians in worship.”
RELATED: Blocking ICE with ‘micro-intifada’: Good’s group taught de-arrest, cop-car chaos before her death
Photo by Jason Alpert-Wisnia/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images
“There’s a Constitution and the First Amendment to freedom of speech and freedom to assemble and protest,” Lemon told Parnell, excusing the mob’s interference and intimidation tactics.
Federal response
“President Trump will not tolerate the intimidation and harassment of Christians in their sacred places of worship,” said White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt. “The Department of Justice has launched a full investigation into the despicable incident that took place earlier today at a church in Minnesota.”
Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon indicated that her office was looking into potential violations of the the Freedom of Access to Clinics Entrances Act “by these people desecrating a house of worship and interfering with Christian worshippers.” Dhillon noted further that the FBI had been “activated too!”
Although liberally and primarily used by the previous administration to lock up pro-life activists, the FACE ACT also prohibits the use of force, threat of force, or physical obstruction to injure, intimidate, or interfere with any person lawfully exercising or seeking to exercise their First Amendment right of religious freedom at a place of religious worship.
Violations can result in prison time and hefty fines as well as civil lawsuits.
Dhillon said in response to Lemon’s defense of the mob action, “A house of worship is not a public forum for your protest! It is a space protected from exactly such acts by federal criminal and civil laws! Nor does the First Amendment protect your pseudo journalism of disrupting a prayer service. You are on notice!”
After speaking with Pastor Parnell and Dhillon, Attorney General Pam Bondi stated, “Attacks against law enforcement and the intimidation of Christians are being met with the full force of federal law.”
“If state leaders refuse to act responsibly to prevent lawlessness, this Department of Justice will remain mobilized to prosecute federal crimes and ensure that the rule of law prevails,” added Bondi.
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