A federal appeals court denied an emergency request from the Justice Department to revive arrest warrants for CNN host Don Lemon and four others in connection with an anti-ICE protest in a St. Paul church last weekend.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit judgment was issued Jan. 23 and unsealed the following day, revealing the Trump administration’s rapid and unusual effort to overturn a federal magistrate judge’s decision not to approve charges against five people.
On Sunday, Jan. 18, protesters disrupted a service at Cities Church in St. Paul after activists determined one of the pastors led the local U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office.
The Justice Department on Jan. 22 announced the arrests of Minneapolis civil rights activist Nekima Levy Armstrong, St. Paul school board member Chauntyll Allen and veteran William Kelly, accusing the trio of violating the federal FACE Act, which protects places of worship, among other spaces. All three were released the following day.
The Justice Department sought to arrest five others, but the federal magistrate judge said there was no probable cause to support charges, according court documents.
In a petition filed Jan. 23, DOJ officials asked the appellate court to take up the matter after Chief U.S. District Judge Patrick Schiltz declined to take immediate action. They argued the arrests were urgent to protect the church’s impending weekend services.
“Copycat raiders of places of worship are an immediate danger as we approach Saturday and Sunday and the Departure of Justice has determined that deterrence of such raiders is essential to protecting the safety of worshippers nationwide,” U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen wrote in a Jan. 22 email to Schiltz.
In letters to the appellate court, Schiltz said the request to review the decision is unusual, and perhaps unprecedented. He planned to discuss it with colleagues on Tuesday, Jan. 27.
