The Justice Department said on Thursday that it had arrested one of the demonstrators who interrupted a church service in St. Paul, Minn., to protest a pastor’s apparent work as an Immigration and Customs Enforcement official.
Attorney General Pam Bondi said on social media that agents with Homeland Security and the F.B.I. had arrested Nekima Levy Armstrong in connection with a protest Sunday at Cities Church that brought the service to a stop and prompted some congregants to leave. The action was one of many furious demonstrations across the state after the fatal shooting of Renee Good by an ICE agent two weeks ago in Minneapolis amid a surge of federal agents to the state.
Several organizers of the protest called for a pastor at the church, David Easterwood, to resign, believing he is also the acting director of ICE’s field office in St. Paul. Videos showed dozens of demonstrators chanting, “ICE out,” and “David Easterwood, out now,” as they marched through the building.
The arrest came as the Trump administration works aggressively to curb protests against immigration enforcement in Minnesota.
Keith Ellison, the Minnesota attorney general, said in an interview with the independent journalist Don Lemon that the protesters were protected by the First Amendment.
“Chanting cannot be a crime; it’s freedom of expression,” Mr. Ellison said. On Tuesday, federal prosecutors issued subpoenas to him and other Democratic officials in Minnesota, expanding an inquiry into their response to the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in the state.
President Trump said in a Truth Social post on Tuesday that he had seen footage of the protest at the church, calling it a raid by “agitators and insurrectionists.” “They are troublemakers who should be thrown in jail, or thrown out of the Country,” he wrote.
The church condemned the protest in a statement on Tuesday, saying that the protesters had “accosted members of our congregation, frightened children, and created a scene marked by intimidation and threat.”
The lead pastor, Jonathan Parnell, said in a phone interview on Tuesday that it was not his practice to comment on the employment of people at the church and expressed concern for the safety of Mr. Easterwood and his family. He did not directly address the protesters’ comments about Mr. Easterwood, an unpaid vocational pastor there, but said: “You can be a Christian and work in law enforcement. That’s not an incompatibility.”
John Yoon is a Times reporter based in Seoul who covers breaking and trending news.
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