Former CNN anchor Don Lemon appears in court after being arrested over protest at Minnesota church service

Journalist Don Lemon was arrested overnight in Los Angeles on Friday. The arrest comes nearly two weeks after Lemon was at an anti-ICE protest that disrupted a service at a church in St. Paul, Minnesota.  

A source familiar with the matter said a grand jury was empaneled Thursday. The FBI and Homeland Security Investigations, a law enforcement agency within the Department of Homeland Security, were involved in the arrest, sources said.

Lemon appeared in federal court in L.A. on Friday afternoon, where he was released on his own recognizance without posting bond. 

The charges are related to a protest in which demonstrators entered St. Paul's Cities Church after discovering that one of its pastors is an ICE official.  

According to court documents, Lemon and eight co-defendants were all indicted on one count each of conspiracy against religious freedom at a place of worship and injuring, intimidating and interfering with the exercise of the right of religious freedom at a place of worship. He did not enter a plea on Friday. His next hearing is scheduled for Feb. 9 in federal court in Minneapolis.   

He does not have to report to probation or pretrial services for supervision, the judge said. Court permission is required for international travel, with the exception of a preplanned trip to France in June. He must also avoid contact with known victims or witnesses and known co-defendants. 

Lemon appeared before the judge in a cream-colored double-breasted suit with a matching T-shirt, the same clothes he was wearing when he was arrested, CBS News learned. L.A. Mayor Karen Bass attended the hearing and was in the gallery.  

"Last night, the DOJ sent a team of federal agents to arrest me in the middle of the night for something that I've been doing for the last 30 years, and that is covering the news," Lemon told reporters outside the courthouse following the hearing. "The First Amendment of the Constitution protects that work for me and for countless other journalists who do what I do. I stand with all of them, and I will not be silenced. I look forward to my day in court."

Abbe Lowell, Lemon's lawyer, previously confirmed he was in L.A. to cover this weekend's Grammy Awards. 

"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 said in a statement. "The First Amendment exists to protect journalists whose role it is to shine light on the truth and hold those in power accountable. There is no more important time for people like Don to be doing this work."

Lowell said the Justice Department has focused on arresting Lemon instead of investigating the federal agents who killed Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota earlier this month, calling it "the real indictment of wrongdoing in this case."  

"This unprecedented attack on the First Amendment and transparent attempt to distract attention from the many crises facing this administration will not stand. Don will fight these charges vigorously and thoroughly in court," he said.

According to the indictment, on Jan. 17, one day before the incident, two of the defendants posted plans for the protest to social media, but kept the location hidden.

The following morning, several dozen people, including Lemon and his eight co-defendants, gathered in the parking lot of a grocery store, where some of them "provided instruction" on what to do once they arrived at the church, the document reads.

Lemon began livestreaming to his social media channel during this gathering, the court documents state, during which he told his audience the group was preparing for a "resistance" operation against federal immigration policies.

"He took steps to maintain operation secrecy by reminding certain co-conspirators to not disclose the target of the operation and stepped away momentarily so his mic would not accidentally divulge certain points of the planning session," the indictment alleges.

Later in the livestream, before the group arrived at the church, Lemon again reiterated to his audience he would not divulge details of where they were going, the document states. And when driving to the church, Lemon said to one of the defendants during the livestream, "Don't give anything away," the court documents read.

Once in the church, Lemon and his eight co-defendants "oppressed, threatened, and intimidated the Church congregants and pastors by physically occupying most of the main aisle and row of chairs near the front of the Church, engaging in menacing and threatening behavior," prosecutors said in the indictment.

The indictment also alleges that Lemon and two co-defendants "largely surrounded" the pastor "in an attempt to oppress and intimidate him," and that Lemon and the protesters ignored the pastor's request that they leave the church.

At one point, the document reads, Lemon stood near the main door of the church and allegedly "confronted some congregants and physically obstructed them" as they tried to leave. 

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement Friday morning shared to social media that federal agents arrested Lemon and three of his co-defendants "in connection with the coordinated attack on Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota." They were identified as Jamael Lydell Lundy, Trahern Jeen Crews and Georgia Ellyse Fort, Bondi said.   

Lundy, Fort and Crews all had their initial appearances in Minnesota federal court Friday, and they were all released on personal recognizance bonds.  

The Justice Department has arrested at least seven of the nine co-defendants in the case. Nekima Levy Armstrong, former president for the Twin Cities chapter of the NAACP, and Chauntyll Louisa Allen, an elected member of the St. Paul School Board, along with William Kelly, were arrested last week. 

CNN, where Lemon previously worked, said his arrest raises "profoundly concerning questions about press freedom and the First Amendment." The network said it will be following Lemon's case closely.

"The Department of Justice already failed twice to get an arrest warrant for Don and several other journalists in Minnesota, where a chief judge of the Minnesota Federal District Court found there was 'no evidence' that there was any criminal behavior involved in their work," CNN said in a statement. "The First Amendment in the United States protects journalists who bear witness to news and events as they unfound, ensuring they can report freely in the public interest, and the DOJ's attempts to violate those rights is unacceptable."

Last week, a federal appellate court declined to order a lower court judge to sign arrest warrants for five people, including Lemon, in connection with a Jan. 18 anti-ICE protest inside the church. However, one of the three appellate court judges said he felt there was probable cause to justify the arrests, according to court filings and sources familiar with the matter.

The Justice Department had asked the appellate court to compel the U.S. District Court in Minnesota to sign the arrest warrants over civil rights charges alleging the defendants were unlawfully interfering with the churchgoers' constitutional-protected freedom to practice religion.

Federal prosecutors in the Minneapolis-based U.S. Attorney's Office had significant concerns with the strength of the evidence in the church protests, a source familiar with the matter told CBS News.

When the first three defendants were initially charged, no career officials from that office appeared in court, and the Justice Department sent two lawyers from the Civil Rights Division in Washington to handle the proceedings.

The magistrate judge overseeing the case only approved one civil rights charge in those original cases against Armstrong and Allen. But the judge nixed a FACE Act charge against each of them on the grounds that there was no probable cause. Both were among those named in Friday's indictment. 

The magistrate judge, Douglas Micko, also rejected five arrest warrants in the case for lacking probable cause, including Lemon's, CBS News previously reported. 

The Justice Department has been scrutinizing the video of the pre-meeting that Lemon filmed before the protest, the source said. The Justice Department has been focusing on the gathering as alleged evidence of a conspiracy to interfere with people's religious rights. Lemon was filming the meeting as part of his reporting, the source added. 

"Although Lemon's factual assertions and DOJ's justifications must be tested in court, this case could set a dangerous precedent for charging reporters who cover protests for the conduct of the protesters if there was any prior communications with the protesters, and could even expose American journalists embedded with the U.S. military to being charged with war crimes along with soldiers who may commit such crimes," said Julius Nam, a former federal prosecutor who handled civil rights cases.

Lemon worked at CNN for more than 15 years, but was fired in 2023. He announced in early 2024 that he would be launching The Don Lemon Show on X, but the social media site owned by billionaire Elon Musk ended the partnership months later, shortly after Lemon interviewed Musk. Lemon now hosts a show on YouTube.