Former CNN host turned independent journalist Don Lemon pleaded not guilty to federal civil rights charges Friday, a case arising from a protest at a Minnesota church where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor. Four others also pleaded not guilty in the case. Roughly two dozen protesters stood outside the building, the AP reports, chanting "Pam Bondi has got to go" and "Protect the press." Two more defendants accused in the protest at a Southern Baptist church in St. Paul are scheduled for arraignment next week, including independent journalist Georgia Fort. Nine people have been charged in the case.
Civil rights attorney Nekima Levy Armstrong was among the other defendants to plead not guilty. The local activist was the subject of a doctored photo posted on official White House social media that falsely showed her crying during her arrest. The picture is part of a deluge of AI-altered imagery that has circulated since the fatal shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal officers in Minneapolis during the Trump administration's immigration enforcement crackdown.
Lemon's attorney Abbe David Lowell told the judge that he will raise First Amendment issues in the case. The veteran journalist has said he was at the church to chronicle the protest but was not a participant. "For more than 30 years, I've been a journalist, and the power and protection of the First Amendment has been the underpinning of my work," Lemon said outside the courthouse after his arraignment. "The First Amendment, the freedom of the press, are the bedrock of our democracy."
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