By Alanna Durkin Richer, Giovanna Dell’Orto and Jack BrookThe Related Press
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A outstanding civil rights lawyer and at the very least two different individuals concerned in an anti-immigration enforcement protest that disrupted a service at a Minnesota church have been arrested, Trump administration officers stated Jan. 22, at the same time as a choose rebuffed associated expenses towards journalist Don Lemon.
Vice President JD Vance, talking in Minneapolis, urged state and native regulation enforcement to collaborate with federal officers and stated protesters should cease getting of their approach.
Legal professional Normal Pam Bondi posted on-line that Nekima Levy Armstrong had been arrested. On Jan. 18, protesters entered the Cities Church in St. Paul, the place an U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official serves as a pastor. Bondi later posted {that a} second individual had been arrested, and FBI Director Kash Patel introduced a 3rd.
The Justice Division shortly opened a civil rights investigation after the group interrupted providers by chanting “ICE out” and “Justice for Renee Good,” referring to the 37-year-old mom of three who was fatally shot by an ICE officer in Minneapolis earlier this month.
“Hear loud and clear: WE DO NOT TOLERATE ATTACKS ON PLACES OF WORSHIP,” the lawyer basic wrote on X.
Cities Church belongs to the Southern Baptist Conference and lists certainly one of its pastors as David Easterwood, who leads an ICE discipline workplace. Many Baptist church buildings have pastors who additionally work different jobs.
Church attorneys reward the arrests
Distinguished leaders of the Southern Baptist Conference have argued that compassion for migrant households can’t justify violating a sacred house throughout worship.
Attorneys representing the church hailed the arrests.
“The U.S. Division of Justice acted decisively by arresting those that coordinated and carried out the horrible crime,” Doug Wardlow, director of litigation for True North Authorized, stated in an announcement.
The St. Paul-based nonprofit regulation agency has taken on non secular freedom circumstances, together with submitting an amicus transient to the U.S. Supreme Court docket supporting a Christian counselor who challenged bans on LGBTQ+ “conversion remedy” for teenagers as a violation of her First Modification rights.
Levy Armstrong, an lawyer and longtime activist, had known as for the pastor affiliated with ICE to resign, saying his twin function poses a “basic ethical battle.”
“You can not lead a congregation whereas directing an company whose actions have price lives and inflicted worry in our communities,” she stated Jan. 20. “When officers defend armed brokers, repeatedly refuse significant investigation into killings like Renee Good’s, and sign they could pursue peaceable protesters and journalists, that isn’t justice — it’s intimidation.”
Protesters seem in courtroom
Levy Armstrong has helped lead protests after the high-profile police-involved killings of Black People, together with George Floyd, Philando Castile and Jamar Clark. She is a former president of the NAACP’s Minneapolis department.
Homeland Safety Secretary Kristi Noem posted a photograph on X of Levy Armstrong together with her arms behind her again subsequent to an individual carrying a badge. Noem stated she faces a cost beneath a statute that bars threatening or intimidating somebody exercising a proper.
Patel posted on X that Chauntyll Louisa Allen, the second individual Bondi stated was arrested, is charged beneath a regulation that prohibits bodily obstructing or utilizing the specter of drive to intimidate or intrude with an individual looking for to take part in a service at a home of worship. Patel stated William Kelly has additionally been arrested.
Levy Armstrong, Kelly and Allen have all been booked about 35 miles (56 kilometers) north of Minneapolis in Sherburne County Jail, the place individuals in federal custody are often held.
A message looking for remark was despatched to Allen’s and Kelly’s lawyer.
Saint Paul Public Colleges, the place Allen is a board of training member, stated it’s conscious of her arrest however is not going to touch upon pending authorized issues.
Allen and Levy Armstrong are a part of a neighborhood of Black Minnesota activists.
Kelly has defended the protest and criticized the church for associating with a pastor who works for ICE.
In courtroom Jan. 22, federal Justice of the Peace choose Doug Micko granted the ladies bond and restricted them from touring exterior Minnesota or from going close to the church. The federal government stated it will attraction..
Levy Armstrong’s lawyer, Jordan Kushner, stated he supplied for her to show herself in peacefully, however the Trump administration insisted on arresting her.
“They needed a spectacle,” Levy Armstrong’s husband, Marques Armstrong, stated, recalling round 50 brokers got here to detain her.
Arrests observe a DOJ civil rights investigation
The Justice Division investigated the church protest swiftly, however discovered no foundation for a civil rights investigation into Good’s demise.
Administration officers have stated the officer acted in self-defense and that the motive force of the Honda was partaking in “an act of home terrorism” when she pulled towards him. Previous administrations, nevertheless, have moved shortly to probe shootings of civilians by regulation enforcement officers.
The Justice Division has individually opened an investigation into whether or not Minnesota officers impeded or obstructed federal immigration enforcement although their public statements.
Prosecutors this week despatched subpoenas to the places of work of Gov. Tim Walz, Legal professional Normal Keith Ellison, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her and officers in Ramsey and Hennepin counties, in line with an individual conversant in the matter.
Choose rejects expenses towards Lemon
A Justice of the Peace choose rejected federal prosecutors’ bid to cost journalist Don Lemon associated to the church protest, stated Kushner, Levy Armstrong’s lawyer.
Lemon has stated he was on the church as a journalist and never a protester.
“As soon as the protest began within the church we did an act of journalism, which was report on it and discuss to the individuals concerned, together with the pastor, members of the church and members of the group,” Lemon stated in a video posted on social media. “That’s it. That’s known as journalism.”
Lemon’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, stated in an announcement that the choose’s motion confirms Lemon’s work as a reporter was protected by the First Modification.
It wasn’t instantly clear what the Justice Division would do after the choose’s determination. Authorities might return to a Justice of the Peace choose to once more search a felony criticism or an indictment towards Lemon earlier than a grand jury.
CNN, which fired Lemon in 2023, first reported the ruling.
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Durkin Richer reported from Washington. Related Press reporters Chris Megerian in Washington; Corey Williams in Detroit; Jack Dura in Bismarck, North Dakota; and Mike Catalini in Trenton, New Jersey, contributed.
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Related Press faith protection receives assist via the AP’s collaboration with The Dialog US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely liable for this content material.
