How Much Trouble is Don Lemon in?

No indictment has been returned against Don Lemon yet, but the digital trail left behind from last Sunday’s Cities Church incident in St. Paul, Minnesota, is already shaping the story in that direction. While there are currently no charging documents and no arrests, what is already visible in public footage, together with statements from the Justice Department, places potential criminal liability squarely in view.

Public footage and reporting indicate that the former CNN anchor, now an independent journalist, embedded with activists who conducted what he described as “reconnaissance” of a church in St. Paul, Minnesota, and then entered an active worship service to protest ICE. They did not remain outside or wait for the service to end. They went in. The service was disrupted. Clergy were confronted. Worship was impeded.

Lemon and his crew filmed the intrusion, participated in the confrontation, interviewed the pastor mid-disruption, expressed agreement with the protesters, and distributed the footage. Those facts are already clear. Others are still developing. But even now, they intersect directly with federal civil-rights statutes aimed specifically at interference with religious worship. And those statutes do not turn on whether someone calls himself a journalist.

When Disruption Becomes a Federal Crime

Federal law contains two overlapping criminal statutes that protect religious worship from obstruction and intimidation: the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, 18 U.S. Code § 248 (the FACE Act), and the Church Arson Prevention Act, 18 U.S.C. § 247. Together, these statutes make it a federal crime to intentionally interfere with religious worship or access to a place of worship, including by force or threats, physical obstruction, interference with congregants, or attacks on religious property.

The actions of the protesting mob at Cities Church on Sunday appear to fit squarely within the conduct these two statutes were enacted to prohibit.Each statute authorizes a sentence of up to one year in prison for a first-time, non-aggravated violation, creating up to two years of total potential exposure.

In addition, if more than one person planned or coordinated that conduct, a third statute follows almost automatically. Under 18 U.S.C. § 241 (the modern criminal descendant of the Reconstruction-era Ku Klux Klan Acts), it is a felony for two or more persons to conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate individuals in the free exercise of rights secured by federal law. United States v. Oropesa, 159 F.4th 912 (11th Cir. 2025). Religious worship is one of those protected rights.

The publicly visible facts already point to coordinated conduct aimed at disrupting services at Cities Church. They obviously planned this to some degree. This is where Don Lemon’s communications, both electronic messages and oral statements, become critical. His own posted videos show him acknowledging involvement in “reconnaissance” of the church, placing him not merely at the scene, but within the planning phase of the operation. If there was an express or implied agreement between Lemon and any of the others to engage in unlawful interference, he faces serious criminal exposure. Assuming no aggravating factors such as injury or death, defendants convicted of federal conspiracy face a statutory maximum of ten years in prison for conspiracy alone.

The Embedded Participant Issue

Further, even if it cannot be proven that Lemon directly violated either of the two civil-rights statutes, or the conspiracy statute, he can still be convicted of aiding and abetting the other violators. Under 18 U.S.C. § 2, anyone who aids or abets the commission of a federal offense is punishable as a principal.

Federal criminal law is not concerned with whether Lemon considers himself a reporter. It is instead focused on his conduct - whether he associated himself with a venture, participated in it as something he wished to bring about, and sought by his actions to make it succeed. That is the core test for accomplice liability. Unlike conspiracy, it does not require proof of a formal agreement, only that the defendant knowingly and intentionally helped the crime succeed.

The Eighth Circuit (which includes Minnesota) has explained that accomplice liability requires only proof that the defendant “intended to promote or facilitate the underlying crime.” United States v. Boleyn, 929 F.3d 932 (8th Cir. 2019).

Lemon’s filming alone likely does not satisfy that standard; so, if an unrelated journalist learned of the encounter and rushed to the scene to film the confrontation, liability would likely not attach – though there would likely still be a question about that journalist brining a camera into private property (the church) to film. But in any event, that’s not what happened with Don Lemon.

Lemon’s own video appears to confirm both his participation in, and agreement with, the mob’s “assembly.” He says as much on camera. The publicly available footage shows Lemon embedding with the protesters, admitting to having conducted prior ‘surveillance’ of the church, entering the church with the mob, confronting the pastor, and arguing with him about the protesters’ claimed right to “assemble” inside his church because of their opposition to ICE. The videos further show Lemon confronting parishioners, pressing them to take positions on controversial political issues, advancing arguments against ICE, making derogatory remarks about white parishioners (calling them “MAGA-coated”) all while broadcasting the events, presumably for commercial gain. He also acknowledges on camera that the invasion is causing trauma to parishioners and identifies crying children, before adding, “that’s what protesting is about.”

It is very difficult to distinguish Don Lemon’s actions here from the actions of the other protesters. And the fact that he has a famous face, and a camera, will very likely be viewed by prosecutors as an enhancing factor, not a mitigating one. Indeed, it seems likely many of the worshipers saw his famous face and the camera as one of the most intimidatingfeatures of the church invasion. When the possible offense is understood as involving an intrusion into private religious worship, it becomes easier to see why a journalist with a camera may be viewed as an active participant rather than a passive observer.

And notwithstanding Lemon’s public assertions, filming yourself engaging in a crime does not immunize you from the crime. Participating in a crime while carrying a camera, just makes you a participant with good evidence. Evidence that, in Lemon’s case, he put out on the internet, and right into the hands of his possible prosecutors.

William Bryan had a camera when two others murdered Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia. (Don Lemon covered that case.) Bryan followed Arbery in his truck and filmed as the other two defendants carried out the killing. Bryan did not fire the weapon and did not initiate the encounter. But federal prosecutors charged him under the civil-rights statutes, and a jury convicted him. The court treated his pursuit, presence, and filming, combined, not as passive observation, but as participation.

This is not a novel issue. The cameraman for GirlsDoPorn didn’t recruit victims nor did he run the illegal website. He was “just the cameraman.” But if he wasn’t filming, the crimes in that case likely would not have occurred. He was charged, and was convicted of conspiracy and sex-trafficking offenses, despite styling himself as “just the cameraman.”

With the explosion of social media, criminals filming their crimes for broadcast is becoming almost commonplace.

We saw this in the high-profile murder of retired police chief Andreas ‘Andy’ Probst, where the passenger in a stolen SUV filmed his friend deliberately driving into Probst as he rode his bicycle in a designated bike lane. The video was later shared on social media, leading to their arrests. Both the driver and the passenger were charged and convicted. The filming was not treated as incidental, but as part of the criminal conduct itself. Would these two have murdered Chief Probst, if they didn’t have a camera? Would the protesters outside the church have waited for Don Lemon to arrive before entering?

We see this dynamic now pervasively in high schools, where a sharp rise in organized fights since 2020 has been linked to the pursuit of online attention and viral “fame.” And we see it again in the current protests in Minnesota, where demonstrators show up to impede ICE wearing costumes and staging performances, clearly anticipating digital distribution.

In each setting, the camera does not merely record the crime. It changes the crime. It incentivizes it. It amplifies it. Lemon’s presence and conduct may therefore be viewed as encouraging the offense and aiding the intimidation and interference itself.

The First Amendment

Lemon’s instinct to run to the First Amendment is not surprising for a journalist but is likely no help to him here. A federal court in Tennessee addressed this clearly last year:

The matter at issue…is whether the defendants violated the FACE Act and/or the conspiracy statute not whether they might also have engaged in some other activities that did not violate the FACE Act…There is no doctrine by which a defendant can use a little bit of First Amendment protected activity to homeopathically immunize a criminal conspiracy. United States v. Gallagher, No. 3:22 cr 00327 (M.D. Tenn. Jan. 5, 2024).

The First Amendment protects prayer. It protects protest. It protects journalism. It clearly does not protect physically obstructing the religious worship of others. If Lemon participated in conduct that meets the statutory elements of obstruction or conspiracy, the presence of expressive components becomes legally irrelevant.

John Sullivan also called himself a journalist. He entered the Capitol with a camera on January 6, 2021. He filmed the breach. He sold his footage. But the evidence also showed him encouraging rioters and shaping events as he recorded them. A federal jury rejected his journalism defense and convicted him of multiple felonies. He was sentenced to six years in federal prison.

Samuel Christopher Montoya was also charged for his actions on January 6^th. He reportedly worked for Infowars. He filmed inside the building, celebrated what was happening on camera, and later published the footage online. The First Amendment didn’t save him either. He was charged and eventually took a plea deal.

Unfortunately for him, Don Lemon now operates in a digital social-media world, where he is no longer filtered through whatever gatekeeping role CNN once played. That reality has already generated a substantial body of potential evidence. On its own, Lemon’s public digital footprint makes criminal exposure increasingly plausible. In theory, if convicted, he may have broadcasted his own crimes.

The Department of Justice has publicly placed Mr. Lemon “on notice” that he is under investigation. That status carries a serious warning: if he now destroys, alters, or conceals any communications, he could face a separate felony charge under 18 U.S.C. § 1519 punishable by up to twenty years in federal prison. And it is those private communications with the others who stormed the church, if they exist, that could help establish another layer of potential federal charges.

If Don Lemon traveled to Minnesota to engage in the church raid, or used interstate electronic communications to help facilitate it, federal prosecutors may also consider charges under 18 U.S.C. § 1952 (the Travel Act), which makes it a separate federal offense to travel in interstate commerce or use any facility of interstate commerce (including mail, telephones, or electronic communications) with the intent to facilitate unlawful activity, and thereafter take steps to carry it out. A violation of the Travel Act is punishable by up to five years’ imprisonment.

If the communications evidence confirms interstate travel or coordinated facilitation, Lemon could be facing many years in federal prison - not for documenting a civil-rights offense, but for engaging in one.