During an interview with ABC‘s Jimmy Kimmel on Monday, former CNN host Don Lemon, 59, touched on his arrest by federal agents after he covered an anti-ICE protest inside a Minnesota church on January 18.
Lemon claimed that after senior DOJ officials began publicly talking about bringing charges against him, his lawyer, Abbe Lowell, contacted the department to discuss the 59-year-old turning himself in, Fox News reported. Lemon, who is now an independent journalist, stated that his lawyer contacted the DOJ before his arrest, but Lowell “never heard back.”
Lemon also shared details of his arrest in Los Angeles on Thursday, January 29. He said that he was confronted by federal agents when he returned to his hotel after attending pre-Grammy events.
“I press the elevator button and then, all of a sudden, I feel myself being jostled and people trying to grab me and put me in handcuffs,” Lemon recalled. “And I said, ‘What are you doing here?’ They said, ‘We came to arrest you.’ I said, ‘Who are you?’ And then they, like, finally identify themselves.”
Lemon also said that he asked the agents to provide a warrant, but they did not have the legal document in their possession. He said a federal agent later provided a copy of the warrant, but it was on a cellphone.
“It had to be maybe a dozen people, which is a waste, Jimmy, of resources,” Lemon told Kimmel. “Because I had told them weeks before, maybe once or twice… that I could just go in, and they didn’t have to be — the folks that were just working there that day, and they didn’t have to have all of these people following me around.”
“It’s more than just a waste of resources,” Kimmel said in response.
“You’re right about more than just a waste of resources,” Lemon replied. “They want that. They want to embarrass you. They want to intimidate you. They want to instill fear, and so that’s why they did it that way.”
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Lemon was ultimately charged with conspiracy to deprive rights and violation of the FACE Act, Fox News reported.
As previously reported by Face2Face Africa, Lemon and a group of anti-ICE protesters entered the Cities Church in Minnesota on Sunday, January 18, to register their displeasure with a pastor and an ICE agent identified as David Easterwood. A service was taking place inside the church when the demonstrators paused it. Lemon, who is now an independent journalist, shared footage of the protest and confrontation.
The DOJ in the indictment claimed that Lemon and the protest organizers made arrangements before they made their way to the church. But Lemon has claimed that he was doing his job as a journalist when he covered the protest inside the church.
“I’ve spent my entire career covering the news. I will not stop now,” Lemon told reporters outside the courthouse on Friday. “There is no more important time than right now, this very moment, for a free and independent media that shines a light on the truth and holds those accountable. And I will not stop now. I will not stop ever.
“Last night, the DOJ sent a team of federal agents to arrest me in the middle of the night for something that I’ve been doing for the last 30 years. And that is covering the news. The First Amendment of the Constitution protects that work for me and for countless other journalists who do what I do. I stand with all of them, and I will not be silenced. I look forward to my day in court.”
Lemon’s arrest also came after a federal magistrate judge in Minnesota initially dismissed the Justice Department’s attempt to charge him.
Lemon is scheduled to make his next court appearance on February 9 in Minneapolis.
