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-Great Cultural Revolution

Minnesota Judge Who Refused Arrest Warrant Against Don Lemon Is Married to Keith Ellison Staffer, Biden judge releases two of three church agitators until trial date

2026-01-24

[Daily Signal] Have you noticed Abbe Lowell is Lawyer To The D-Dirt bags? Lisa Cook, Hunter Biden, Don Lemon,...
A magistrate judge refused to sign an arrest warrant for leftist commentator Don Lemon on charges related to his presence at a church invasion Sunday, and the judge’s ties to Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison have raised questions about a potential conflict of interest.

Lemon traveled with and recorded a group of 30-40 agitators who disrupted a service at Cities Church in St. Paul Sunday. The agitators targeted the church because a pastor on staff also appears to be the acting director of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in St. Paul.

Lemon claims he was present as a reporter, not a participant.

Authorities arrested three of the group’s ringleaders Thursday on federal charges, but multiple sources confirmed to Fox News’ Bill Melugin that Magistrate Judge Douglas L. Micko had denied the Justice Department’s arrest warrant for Lemon. Melugin reported that Micko’s wife works as an assistant attorney general in Ellison’s office.

Lemon’s attorney, Abbe Lowell, praised the magistrate judge’s decision.

“The magistrate’s reported actions confirm the nature of Don’s First Amendment protected work this weekend in Minnesota as a reporter,” Lowell told Fox News Digital. “Should the Department of Justice continue with a stunning and troubling effort to silence and punish a journalist for doing his job, Don will call out their latest attack on the rule of law and fight any charges vigorously and thoroughly in court.”

CITIES CHURCH RESPONDS
Renee Carlson, who represents Cities Church as general counsel for True North Counsel, highlighted a previous statement suggesting that, even if Lemon avoids all criminal liability, he may face civil liability.

“The First Amendment does not allow premeditated plots or coordinated actions to violate the sanctity of a sanctuary, disrupt worship, and intimidate small children,” Carlson said in a previous statement she highlighted for The Daily Signal. “There is no ‘press pass’ to invade a sanctuary or to conspire to interrupt religious services.”

PJ Media adds:

Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon revealed earlier this week that federal prosecutors were pursuing multiple potential charges over the church invasion, citing the FACE Act as one possible avenue. She noted that while the law has traditionally been used against pro-life activists, the Biden Justice Department expanded its use, and the Trump administration now plans to apply the same legal tools against left-wing extremists who targeted churchgoers.

Dhillon also revealed that another tool at their disposal was the Ku Klux Klan Act. "In other cases, the Biden DOJ used the Klan Act conspiracy charges tacked onto the FACE Act in the case of protests outside abortion clinics to bring much longer sentences," she explained. "So there are a number of tools available to us."

She added, "The Klan Act is one of the most important federal civil rights statutes, and it goes back to the time when President Lincoln emancipated the slaves, and yet the southern states, Dixiecrats mainly, were refusing to give them equal rights.”

Biden-Appointed Judge Releases MN Church Agitators Nekima Armstrong, Chauntyll Allen
[RedState] Biden-appointed U.S. District Judge Laura Provinzino ruled that two of the most prominent figures in Saturday’s anti-ICE raid on the Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota — Nekima Armstrong and Chauntyll Allen — should be released because they don’t pose a "flight risk."

They may not be a flight risk, but they are certainly a threat to continue their efforts against federal law enforcement — and even houses of worship.

The decision did impose some restrictions on the defendants, however:

Those included: (1) supervision by U.S. Probation and Pretrial Services; (2) travel outside of Minnesota restricted unless approved by a supervising officer; (3) no-contact with any victims or witnesses of the charged offense; (4) no possession of a firearm, destructive device, or other weapon; and (5) at the request of the United States, a stay-away condition which reads: “Defendant shall stay away from the church location identified in the Complaint Affidavit. ‘Stay away’ means no closer than the public sidewalk nearest to the location of the Church.”

They must also surrender their passports.

To be clear, this does not mean the charges have been dropped or that the pair will not still face consequences in the court of law. It's not at all unusual for suspects deemed "non-~~violent~~ mostly peaceful" to be released before their trial date. In fact, the judge found that the "charged conspiracy is not a crime of violence." You be the judge of whether their incursion on the church was non-~~violent~~ mostly peaceful.

It’s not the first anti-administration ruling Judge Provinzino has issued: Earlier in January, she blocked Trump from withholding tens of millions in aid to Minnesota's food stamp program while the government investigates the epidemic of fraud in Tim Walz

...Kamala's smarmy-looking VP running mate, governor of Minnesota and self-admitted knucklehead, who decided to retire rather than to deploy with his National Guard unit, then claimed to have been in Iraq and Afghanistan. One man's socialism is another man's neighborliness....
’s Gopher State.

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