Federal Agents Arrest Don Lemon Over Church Storming Incident
Federal agents arrested former CNN host Don Lemon Thursday evening in Los Angeles on charges allegedly related to the storming of an evangelical church in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Lemon covered the Jan. 18 incident in which anti-ICE rioters stormed Cities Church in St. Paul, saying he was doing journalism. His lawyer, Father Lowell, confirmed that Lemon had been taken into custody in a statement sent to several media outlets.
#BREAKING: Don Lemon taken into custody by federal agents in Los Angeles. His lawyer’s statement below ⤵️ @NewsNation pic.twitter.com/tDwoMfbMux
– Antwan Harris (@aharrisTV) January 30, 2026
“Don Lemon was arrested by federal agents last night in Los Angeles, where he was covering the Grammy Awards,” Lowell’s statement said. “Don has been a journalist for 30 years, and his constitutionally protected work in Minneapolis is no different than what he has always done. The First Amendment exists to protect journalists whose role is to shed light on the truth and hold those in power accountable. There is no more important time for people like Don to do this work.”
Lowell did not specify what charges Lemon faces in the statement, although other media outlets have reported that they stem from the church storming incident.
Attorney General Pam Bondi announced the arrest of Lemon and three others in connection with the attack on her X account.
At my direction, early this morning, federal agents arrested Don Lemon, Trahern Jeen Crews, Georgia Fort, and Jamael Lydell Lundy, in connection with the coordinated attack on Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota.
More details soon.
– Attorney General Pamela Bondi (@AGPamBondi) January 30, 2026
“At my direction, early this morning, federal agents arrested Don Lemon, Trahern Jeen Crews, Georgia Fort and Jamael Lydell Lundy, in connection with the coordinated attack on Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota,” Bondi said.
Lemon broadcast footage of the disturbance on his YouTube channel, arriving at Cities Church about 40 minutes into a lengthy Sunday livestream during which he praised Nekima Levy Armstrong, who led the group that stormed the church, saying one of her pastors worked for ICE. While Lemon denied on January 18 that he knew the church would be targeted, at the start of his livestream he seemed to know where the group was going.
“These operations are surprise operations,” Lemon said at the start of his Sunday livestream. “Again, I can’t tell you where they are going and where we are gathered at the moment.”
Lemon also defended the service disruption during a Jan. 19 appearance on the “I’ve Had It” podcast hosted by left-wing podcaster Jennifer Welch.
“I think there’s obviously… racism in there. The problem is they’re trying to detain people on the street because of their accent and the color of their skin and they’re also targeting people of color, black people as well as brown people,” Lemon said. “So there is a certain level of racism and there is a certain level of entitlement.”
“I think people who belong to religious groups like that, that’s not the type of Christianity that I practice, but I think they’re entitled to it and that entitlement comes from supremacy, from white supremacy, and they think that this country was built for them, that it’s a Christian country, when in fact we left England because we wanted religious freedom,” Lemon continued. (RELATED: Don Lemon defends protesters who stormed Minneapolis church service, believing pastor was ‘affiliated with ICE’)
Anti-ICE riots in Minneapolis grew more intense after an ICE agent fatally shot Renée Nicole Good during a “targeted” immigration enforcement operation on January 7, an ICE agent injured one of three illegal immigrants who ambushed him, and the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by a Border Patrol agent on January 24.
Pretti’s neighbors told the Mirror that he was involved in an anti-ICE network. Pretti was injured in a previous encounter with ICE in the days before his fatal encounter, suffering a broken rib, CNN reported.
Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon told podcaster Benny Johnson during a media appearance on Jan. 19 that Lemon could potentially be charged with violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.
This is breaking news. This article will be updated with more information.
All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent, nonpartisan news service, is available free to any legitimate news publisher capable of delivering a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and DCNF affiliation. For questions about our guidelines or our partnership, please contact licenses@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
