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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   31750 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 26, 2026

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What I’m not seeing mentioned here is Lemon’s defense; he says he was watching the protest as a journalist, which to be fair was his career and he claims to be doing independent journalism after his retirement from CNN. We do have video of him doing things like interviewing protestors and the pastor (who asked him to leave), and commenting on the contrast between people yelling and protesting and people trying to pray as demonstrative of a divided America. I don’t know that it’s great journalism, but it’s a more complex situation than “Don Lemon was rioting in a church.”

I think Don Lemon should be charged with trespassing, maybe criminal mischief, etc, particularly since he remained in the church after the pastor asked him politely to leave and told him that he was contributing to the disruption of their worship service. But I don’t know if it’s appropriate for him, personally, to be charged with civil rights offenses. The organizers of the protest and the people chanting and screaming during the worship services should be slapped with those, though. I think it’s important to draw a firm line on protesting and disrupting religious services, lest we become a nation where Christians start screaming about devil-worship in mosques or Palestinians start screaming about Gaza in synagogues.

I think Don Lemon should be charged with trespassing, maybe criminal mischief, etc, particularly since he remained in the church after the pastor asked him politely to leave and told him that he was contributing to the disruption of their worship service. But I don’t know if it’s appropriate for him, personally, to be charged with civil rights offenses.

There is a trope of journalists standing in front of some perfectly innocent-looking building reporting on some Breaking News while the news is happening somewhere within that building. They generally do that because they are not allowed to enter the building and get footage of the event itself.

If Lemon had been reporting from the street outside the church, reasonable people would not blame him for anything, even if he had been tipped off by anti-ICE rioters.

Entering together with the rioters makes him look like what is called an "embedded journalist". While I am sure that embedded journalists will claim that they are actually totally neutral and independent an in no way beholden to the party in whose unit they are embedded and who sponsored their kevlar west (and whose PR people possibly get to sign of any publications they might write), I am equally sure that their opponent will not be very inclined to buy that if they are captured and instead treat them as PoWs.

Lemon being a TV person, I presume that he was recording video from within the church. Here in old Europe, we believe that people have a reasonable expectation of privacy. Now that is not an absolute thing, if your worship involves sacrificing kids to the Outer Gods, then there would be a public interest a journalist fulfills in violating your privacy of worship.

Frankly, I fail to see any public interest for life video coverage here. If schoolchild A is bullying schoolchild B, and then schoolchild C pulls out their mobile and openly lifestreams that to the internet, I am much more inclined to call C a bully than a journalist. I do not need to see the footage to know that some of the anti-ICE protesters are total assholes, a textual summary of what happened suffices for that. There is no Pulitzer to be won here.

So I am fine with letting the jury figure out if he was intentionally violating civil rights or not.

I don't know that a trespassing charge would stick here. I can't speak for the particularities of Minnesota law, but PA has three basic categories of trespass:

  • Criminal Trespass, the most serious, which involves breaking into buildings.
  • Simple Trespass, the least serious, which involves entering property with the intent of causing damage to the premises
  • Defiant trespass, which involves either entering property that you're clearly meant to be kept out of (like if it was posted or there was a fence), or not leaving at the request of the owner

The only category that would apply here would be defiant trespass, since the church was ostensibly open to the public. In the video, the pastor politely asks Lemon to leave and then walks away. Lemon leaves 7 minutes later. Again, I can't speak for Minnesota, but most of the cases where someone is prosecuted for defiant trespass in PA involve someone ignoring repeated demands to leave, and then remaining there until the police show up. Realistically, the police aren't going to prosecute based on video evidence or testimony unless they're in a very small town with nothing else to do. When I had my own practice I would occasionally get calls about people who caught poachers on their property and wanted to sue them. In these cases they always called the police, who weren't about to run plates and arrest people who had already left (they were usually caught coming out of the woods). Lemon might be guilty of defiant trespass withing the strict letter of the law, but he might not, and the case is blurry enough that most police and prosecutors don't think it's worth the hassle. In PA refusing an order to leave is a misdemeanor which will probably get you six months probation. I'd expect that if a prosecutor were willing to push a case like this he'd probably bargain it down to a summary offense, which would be in line with ignoring a posted sign.

What I’m not seeing mentioned here is Lemon’s defense; he says he was watching the protest as a journalist, which to be fair was his career and he claims to be doing independent journalism after his retirement from CNN. We do have video of him doing things like interviewing protestors and the pastor (who asked him to leave), and commenting on the contrast between people yelling and protesting and people trying to pray as demonstrative of a divided America. I don’t know that it’s great journalism, but it’s a more complex situation than “Don Lemon was rioting in a church.”

Having had a chance to think about this, it looks to me like he was a part of the conspiracy or is otherwise criminally responsible. Arguably, part of the plan was to disrupt the church service simply by having a large number of people in the room. So I think that anyone joining the group; knowing about the plan; entering the church with the group; and refusing to leave when asked, should be prosecuted. I'm not familiar with the particulars of the law in question, this is just what seems reasonable to me. (I'm also assuming that Don Lemon was asked to leave and refused.)

Besides, I don't think being a "journalist" should give a person any more rights than they otherwise would have. I think anyone who was a part of the group; who entered the church; and who refused to leave when asked should be charged.

Lemon is alleged to have helped plan it.

Imagine Lemon and others talked about robbing a bank. He goes along and interviews the bank employees whilst the bank robbery is committed.

Seems clearly his “journalist” defense is invalid.

The specific indictment language includes accusasions of things that could be plausibly construed as conspiracy and pre-planning with the event organizers who, ultimately planned a church invasion.

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