The Department of Justice (DOJ) has charged 30 more people for their alleged involvement in the Jan. 18 anti-immigration enforcement protest at a Minnesota church.
In total, 39 people have been charged with civil rights violations stemming from the Jan. 18 incident at the church in St. Paul.
This includes journalists Don Lemon and Georgia Fort, along with local activist Nekima Levy Armstrong. All three have pleaded not guilty.
Protesters descended on the church after learning that one of its pastors also serves as an ICE official.
The Trump administration has accused demonstrators of intimidating worshippers as they openly practiced their Christian faith, calling it a violation of their constitutional right and an attack on a place of worship.
Armstrong, a civil rights lawyer, said critics needed to “check their hearts” if they were more concerned about a disruption than the “atrocities” that were happening in the community, referring to the deaths of two residents who were killed by federal agents.
The DOJ opened a civil rights investigation into the church protest.
“Young children were left to wonder, as one child put it, if their parents were going to die,” the indictment states.
Two people planned and “conducted reconnaissance” outside the church the day before the demonstration, according to the court filing. The pair recorded their visit to the church on video, with one stating: “My thoughts are to be able to close up this whole alleyway right here."
The court filing quotes one protester in the church chanting: “This ain’t God’s house. This is the house of the devil.”
Doug Wardlow, a lawyer representing the church, praised the DOJ for bringing charges against more people.
“The First Amendment does not give anyone—regardless of profession, prominence, or politics—license to storm a church and intimidate, threaten, and terrorize families and children worshipping inside,” Wardlow said in a statement.