“Independent journalist” and former CNN anchor Don Lemon filed a motion today in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis seeking the release of grand jury transcripts in the federal civil rights case against him. From the AP:
Lemon pleaded not guilty in February to federal civil rights charges, following a protest at a Minnesota church where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor. He is one of 39 people charged in the January incident.
Lemon insists he was at the Cities Church in St. Paul to chronicle the Jan. 18 protest but was not a participant.
Lemon and another independent journalist, Georgia Fort, filed a motion in February seeking transcripts of the grand jury proceedings that resulted in the indictments against them and seven others.
In the latest filing in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis, Lemon’s attorneys argue that “the past 15 months have seen an unprecedented and growing distrust in the Justice Department’s use of the grand jury process.” For that reason, the transcripts from Lemon’s grand jury should be released, his attorneys said.
“In the past two weeks alone, several courts have chastised Justice Department prosecutors for irregularities in the grand jury process and gone so far as to dismiss indictments for grand jury misconduct,” Lemon’s attorneys said in the Wednesday filing.
Lemon and journalist Georgia Fort face charges tied to a Jan. 18 protest that disrupted worship at Cities Church in St. Paul. Prosecutors charged 39 defendants in the case, while Lemon insists he attended the protest to document events as a journalist, not to join the disruption.
The case centers on a protest at a house of worship connected to David Easterwood, a Cities Church pastor who also serves as acting director of the ICE field office in St. Paul.
Protesters entered during Sunday worship, chanted, confronted people inside, and turned a sacred space into a political theater.
Lemon's defenders want the country to see only a journalist with a camera. Worshippers had reason to see something else: a service interrupted, a congregation targeted, and a church treated like fair game because activists disliked the pastor's government job.
Lemon is now arguing that recent grand jury problems in other federal cases make the transcripts necessary, with his attorneys pointing to dismissals and judicial rebukes in Chicago, Wyoming, and Rhode Island.
They also note that judges rejected earlier search warrant requests involving Lemon's YouTube account and cellphone information tied to other defendants. Several judges, including Minnesota's chief federal judge, found no probable cause to support complaints against Lemon and Fort before prosecutors went to the grand jury.
Fine.
Release the transcripts if the judge finds a legal basis. Grand jury secrecy shouldn't become a magic curtain when defendants raise real procedural concerns. Due process applies even to Don Lemon, a man who has spent much of his public career sounding as if due process were optional whenever his preferred villains stood accused. A courtroom can't operate on cable-news certainty, social-media applause, or the roar of a chant inside a church.
Then-U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi signed the indictment. Harmeet Dhillon, assistant general for the Civil Rights Division, has been deeply involved in the administration's civil rights posture.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche defended the idea that press freedom doesn't protect trespass or conduct embedded with rioters. Lemon and Fort entered not guilty pleas in February, with their attorneys arguing the government stretched federal law too far, while prosecutors maintain the grand jury had enough evidence to charge interference with religious exercise.
Lemon's public brand makes the case harder to separate from his story. CNN canned him in 2023 after a messy final stretch that included backlash over his remarks about Nikki Haley and wider allegations about workplace behavior, which Lemon disputed. From the AP:
CNN fired longtime host Don Lemon on Monday following his short and disastrous run as a morning show host, a little over two months after he apologized for on-air comments about Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley being past her prime.
The move quickly turned nasty. While CNN chairman and CEO Chris Licht announced, after Lemon had co-hosted the show Monday, that they had “parted ways,” Lemon characterized it as a firing and said it was surprise to him.
“After 17 years at CNN I would have thought someone in management would have the decency to tell me directly,” Lemon said. CNN said that Lemon was given the opportunity to meet with management but released a statement on Twitter instead.
CNN offered no public explanation for Lemon’s dismissal. During a February discussion on “CNN This Morning” with co-hosts Poppy Harlow and Kaitlan Collins about the ages of politicians, he said that the 51-year-old Haley was not “in her prime.” A woman, he said, was considered in her prime “in her 20s, 30s and maybe her 40s.”
Harlow challenged Lemon, trying to clarify what he was referencing: “I think we need to qualify. Are you talking about prime for childbearing or are you talking about prime for being president?”
A man who built a career around moral lectures now asks a federal judge to believe the government may have cut corners against him.
Maybe it did, but courts exist for exactly those moments.
Still, Lemon's sudden reverence for process carries a rich flavor after years of sanctimony served by the ladle.
The hard question isn't whether Lemon can report on a protest. He can. The harder question is whether a journalist keeps full protection while moving with activists into a church service, questioning a pastor at close range, and helping amplify a disruption aimed at worshippers.
The First Amendment protects the press, and it also protects the free exercise of religion. Lemon wants the first protection honored, yet Cities Church deserved the second one.
Up to this point, I tried remaining objective toward Lemon and this situation. The fact of the matter is that Lemon's arrogance is legendary; the man believes he's the smartest and best person in the room.
A man like Lemon, who behaves as though his actions are protected because he was acting as though he was simply documenting a protest, becomes an anathema to people like Nick Shirley and Andy Ngo, who stick their necks out to share the truth.
When life gives you Don Lemon, file the motion, demand the transcripts, and watch the judge toss the whole sour mess right back in your smug face with a contempt citation.
Don Lemon’s case raises a real question about press freedom, but it also exposes the arrogance of activist journalism when a church service becomes a stage. PJ Media VIP helps keep sharp, independent commentary alive without the approved narratives and soft-focus excuses. Use promo code FIGHT for 60% off today.
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