Video footage appears to contradict key aspects of a federal indictment’s descriptions of former CNN anchor Don Lemon’s actions at a protest last month inside a church in St. Paul, Minnesota, according to a review by The Washington Post.
Lemon, another independent journalist and several protesters are all charged with the same two criminal counts. They are accused of conspiring to deprive congregants of their religious rights and of interfering with access to a place of worship.
The Jan. 29 indictment calls the nine defendants “agitators” and says they “entered the Church in a coordinated takeover-style attack.” In multiple instances it describes the alleged conduct of the two journalists and the protesters collectively. It does not characterize Lemon or Georgia Fort as journalists, though it notes that he was live-streaming video to his online program “The Don Lemon Show” and that Fort, acting separately, conducted an interview at one point.
Journalists have a long history of embedding with protesters without facing charges, but being present as a reporter does not guarantee immunity, according to experts. At least one independent journalist who was inside the Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, assault was later convicted of trespassing and other misdemeanor crimes.
Experts said that if Lemon was operating as a journalist during the Jan. 18 protest at Cities Church in St. Paul — rather than as a participant — that could undermine accusations that he was part of a conspiracy or that he intended to interfere with protected rights. During the approximately 45 minutes Lemon live-streamed at the church, he conducted interviews and repeatedly identified himself as a reporter, while also voicing sympathy for the protesters’ cause.
The indictment notes that Lemon — whose anti-Trump commentary has made him a favorite target of the political right — addressed his live-stream viewers from a parking lot where protesters were gathering ahead of what he called a “clandestine operation.” He said he was not disclosing where they had assembled or where they were going. He was driven to the church by a college student who was working with him that day as a producer — an individual who footage shows later chanted with protesters inside the church.
Lemon is due back in federal court in Minneapolis on Friday and has not yet entered a plea.
After Lemon’s arrest, his attorney Abbe D. Lowell said in a statement: “Don has been a journalist for 30 years, and his constitutionally protected work in Minneapolis was no different than what he has always done.” Lowell declined to comment for this story.
In a live stream Fort posted before her arrest, she said, “It’s hard to understand how we have constitutional rights when you can just be arrested for being a member of the press.”
A spokeswoman for the Justice Department declined to comment for this story. Court filings indicate that investigators reviewed multiple live streams as well as footage from the church, which has not been made public.
“Don Lemon participated in the disruption of a worship service on private property and was asked to leave,” said Greg Scott, a representative of True North Law, a legal firm for the church, adding that Lemon remained in the sanctuary for some time and went on to “harass congregants” outside the sanctuary.
Lemon allegedly ‘oppressed, threatened, and intimidated’ parishioners
The indictment alleges that Lemon, Fort and the other seven defendants “oppressed, threatened, and intimidated” people in the church “by physically occupying most of the main aisle and rows of chairs near the front of the Church, engaging in menacing and threatening behavior.”
The protesters targeted the church that day because they believed a pastor there also served as a local official with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Video shows Lemon entering the church alone, shortly before 11 a.m.
A live stream from Black Lives Matter Minnesota captures Lemon standing at the back of the sanctuary when the protest begins about two minutes later. He soon moves forward to where the demonstrators are gathered and can be heard on his feed narrating the events for his audience.
Fort’s live stream shows protesters chanting anti-ICE slogans and in some cases confronting parishioners. In one instance, a protester — one of the other defendants — confronts a nearby parishioner about the immigration crackdown in Minnesota. “Why are you ignoring the crimes of humanity that are happening in the city every day?” he says, his voice raised.
Lemon remains toward the front of the church — sometimes off to the side and sometimes near the main aisle — for roughly 16 minutes. For less than half of that time, he is off-camera but his feed remains live with audio from his microphone. His feed drops out entirely on several occasions for a few seconds at a time. The videos and audio reviewed by The Post contain no indication Lemon threatened church congregants or chanted or yelled.
“I’m not part of the group; I’m just here photographing. I’m a journalist,” Lemon can be heard telling someone a little under three minutes after the protest started. He then exits the crowd, squeezing between rows as he heads to the side of the sanctuary.
Lemon’s producer for the day, Jerome Richardson, who is among those charged, can be seen engaging in call-and-response with protesters.
On his feed, Lemon speaks about how harshly people are “being treated on the streets” and about what he says are violations of due process. Of the protest, he says: “You have to be willing to go into places and disrupt and make people uncomfortable. That is what this country is about.”
Lemon accused of trying to ‘oppress and intimidate’ a pastor
The indictment alleges that Lemon, Fort and Richardson “largely surrounded” a pastor, standing close to him “in an attempt to oppress and intimidate him, and physically obstructed his freedom of movement,” while Lemon “peppered him with questions to promote the operation’s message.”
After cutting out briefly, Lemon’s feed restarts when he is standing to the pastor’s right, the microphone up to the pastor’s face, and the camera operator is in front of the pastor.
The pastor, Jonathan Parnell, is not the pastor protesters believed worked for ICE.
Fort soon approaches and stands on Parnell’s left, filming as she holds out her microphone. Footage reviewed by The Post shows Richardson standing near the pastor and Lemon before the camera pans away.
Parnell tells Lemon the demonstrators were asked to leave but would not, and he calls the protest “shameful.”
After a few questions, Parnell attempts to draw the conversation to a close, telling Lemon he needs to “take care of my flock, my family.” When Lemon asks him another question, the pastor appears to place his right hand on Lemon’s side.
“I want to be respectful, but please don’t push me,” Lemon tells him, and Parnell lifts his hand from the reporter’s side.
The Justice Department indictment alleges, without explanation, that it was Lemon who “caused the pastor’s right hand to graze Lemon.”
Lemon presses ahead. He asks Parnell if he tried to talk to the protesters, to which the pastor responds: “No one is willing to talk. … I have to take care of my church and my family, so I ask that you actually would also leave this building, unless you’re here to worship.”
“I always worship; I am a Christian,” Lemon says.
He thanks Parnell and steps aside. The pastor walks away, ending the interview, which lasted for less than two minutes.
In the video and audio reviewed by The Post, at no point does Lemon appear to obstruct the pastor’s movement.
Scott, the representative at the church’s legal firm, said: “It is indisputable that Lemon invaded the pastor’s space while his church was being invaded. There is no world in which the aggressor and the accosted can be flipped here.”
The charge of interfering with access to a place of worship was brought under a rarely used provision in the Face Act, enacted in 1994 primarily to combat violence, threats and blockades targeting abortion clinics and other reproductive health facilities.
Judy Appelbaum, who as counsel to then-Sen. Edward M. Kennedy was the lead congressional staffer in drafting the legislation, reviewed the live-streamed footage for The Post.
She said the law defines physical obstruction as preventing someone from entering or exiting a place of worship or making it unreasonably difficult or hazardous, adding, “That’s a tall order, and I don’t think the video showed that.”
Seven minutes after he was asked to leave, Lemon exits the sanctuary and begins interviewing people outside and at the entrance of the church.
Lemon allegedly ‘obstructed’ congregants leaving the church
The indictment alleges that Lemon “confronted some congregants” and “physically obstructed them as they tried to exit the Church building to challenge them with ‘facts’ about U.S. immigration policy.”
The video shows Lemon holding the door for people who are leaving. One parishioner walks out and briefly answers questions from Lemon, who identifies himself as a journalist in the conversation, before the churchgoer says, “I don’t want to interview right now.”
Lemon says, “Okay, thank you, I appreciate it.”
Lemon steps inside the church’s first set of doors and approaches a worshiper who appears to be leaving. He asks: “Can I talk to you, sir? What do you think of this?” The man responds that he agrees with the right to protest but disagrees with the demonstrators’ approach.
As protesters begin to stream out, the man also tells Lemon that he believes Trump’s immigration operation is keeping Americans safe.
“Do you believe that?” Lemon asks. “Honestly, let me talk to you, just on the facts.”
“You’re not a journalist,” the man responds, walking away.
Lemon follows him outside, attempting to continue the conversation, saying that “undocumented people and immigrants commit far less crime than American citizens.”
“We’re done here,” the man says.
Lemon says into his microphone, ‘That’s the interesting thing about this, is that they won’t listen to facts.”
The man overhears and interjects, “No, no, no.” He accuses Lemon of posing as a journalist and not sharing the facts from both sides. Lemon tries to continue the conversation, trailing him outside, until the man walks away.
Though Lemon persists in his questioning and has a disagreement with the parishioner, at no time does the man appear in footage to be physically prevented from leaving the church.
“There is clearly no physical obstruction of that exit,” said Appelbaum, who later served as director of the Federal Legislation Clinic at the Georgetown University Law Center. “And I don’t see any use of force, nor any threat of force.”
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