Will former CNN personality Don Lemon and the activist mob that disrupted a St. Paul church service finally be held to the same legal standard as the elderly pro-life protesters who were hauled off in handcuffs? Donald Trump clearly hopes so — even if it 40 years of prison time.
Lemon wasn’t just an observer. He was right there as a left-wing group calling itself the Racial Justice Network stormed Sunday services at Cities Church, turning a place of worship into a political battleground. Their alleged justification, according to the New York Post, was that one of the church’s pastors — who wasn’t even present — may have worked with the local ICE field office:
An anti-ICE mob stormed a church today in the middle of a service.
This desecration of Christian worship has no place in America.
DOJ is investigating for violations of the FACE Act.
Meanwhile, Don Lemon narrates and defends their actions.
Sickening.pic.twitter.com/OWG38NDa80
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) January 19, 2026
A swarm of anti-ICE protesters burst into a St. Paul, Minnesota, church in the middle of Sunday service and accused a pastor of working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The demonstrators with the Racial Justice Network stormed into the Cities Church and called out resident pastor David Eastwood, whom they accused of moonlighting as the acting field office director for ICE in Minnesota.
A David Eastwood is listed as an employee with the field office, but it’s still unclear if that is the same man as the Cities Church pastor. The Post has reached out to the Department of Homeland Security to check.
The service disrupters chanted slogans heard at the dozens of other protests that have wreaked havoc around Minneapolis, including some invoking slain anti-ICE activist and mom of three Renee Nicole Good’s name. Others specifically slandered Eastwood for misrepresenting the ideals of his faith through his support for ICE.
“This cannot be a house of God while harboring someone directing ICE agents to wreak havoc on our community. I am a reverend on top of being a lawyer and an activist, so I come here in the power of the almighty God,” one protester, Nekima Levy-Armstrong, told ousted CNN host Don Lemon during his livestream.
Lemon insists he had no idea the disruption was coming — a claim that collapses under even the lightest scrutiny. That’s a tough sell when video shows him calmly interviewing an activist who explicitly laid out exactly what was about to happen:
Don Lemon is really spiraling now and is pretending he knew nothing about the attack on the Christian church in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Sunday until it happened.
Unfortunately for Lemon, he posted a video of an interview with the ringleader BEFORE the attack occurred.
Lemon… https://t.co/BuQCTwyzwa pic.twitter.com/uoQUNkcnKl
— Paul A. Szypula ?? (@Bubblebathgirl) January 19, 2026
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On Monday, the president addressed the situation on his Truth Social account by reposting an image of an X post that referenced a different case that could also be prosecuted under the same act.On Monday, the president addressed the situation on his Truth Social account by reposting an image of an X post that referenced a different case that could also be prosecuted under the same act.
“A small group of elderly ladies were protesting at an abortion clinic and were given 40 years in prison for violating the FACE Act,” she wrote.”
“I would like to see the same kind of sentence for Don Lemon and the people that broke into that church and did that during services.”
To be clear, it’s not even obvious which case she’s referring to — but the most likely candidate is a Biden Justice Department prosecution stemming from October 2020. In that case, the DOJ breathlessly claimed in a press release that a group of individuals — men and women, nearly all over 30 and some as old as 75 — faced years in prison for what it labeled “a conspiracy” to block access to a Washington, D.C., reproductive health clinic. Translation: peaceful protesters standing in the way of abortions at an abortion facility.
Under the Biden administration’s Department of Justice, violations of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act were treated like major federal crimes. Ten people ultimately received nearly 23 years in combined prison sentences. So yes, the math may be a bit fuzzy and the talking points aren’t perfectly precise.
But hold on — you might be asking what a law about blocking abortion clinics has to do with storming a church service. Fair question. And the answer is exactly why this matters. When the bill was signed into law in 1994, it wasn’t narrowly written to protect abortion facilities. Tucked inside was language broad enough to cover places of worship as well — a detail the left is suddenly very eager to ignore now that one of their mobs is the one doing the disrupting:
Whoever … by force or threat of force or by physical obstruction, intentionally injures, intimidates or interferes with or attempts to injure, intimidate or interfere with any person lawfully exercising or seeking to exercise the First Amendment right of religious freedom at a place of religious worship … shall be subject to the penalties provided in subsection (b) and the civil remedies provided in subsection (c).
And what are those penalties? Up to a year in prison for a first offense, up to three years for subsequent violations, plus hefty fines on top.
Yes — this is what the kids like to call the “find out” phase.
No, this isn’t going to end with 40-year sentences for everyone involved. That kind of outcome depends on how many participants prosecutors decide to charge, and neither Don Lemon nor the individual political agitators who helped disrupt the service are likely to spend decades behind bars.
But let’s dispense with the fantasy that the law was applied gently or sparingly under Joe Biden. The FACE Act was wielded aggressively and repeatedly by the Biden Department of Justice, with zero interest in leniency — even when defendants sincerely believed they were acting according to conscience. The message was clear: punishment first, mercy never.
We’re often told there’s no two-tiered system of justice. Fine. Then precedent matters. Once the government establishes that peaceful-but-illegal disruptions merit serious prison time, it doesn’t get to selectively forget that standard when the offenders are left-wing activists storming a church instead of pro-lifers kneeling in a hallway.
No, those crushing sentences never should have been handed down to abortion-center protesters. But they were. The law is clear, and the Biden DOJ made sure everyone understood it by making examples out of them. If the justice system is going to retain even a shred of credibility, the Trump DOJ should apply the same law with the same seriousness to everyone involved in this disgraceful episode — including Don Lemon.
