DOJ Considers Ku Klux Klan Act Charges Against Don Lemon Following Minnesota Church Incident

Published: 1/19/2026, 5:22:18 PM EST

DOJ Considers Ku Klux Klan Act Charges Against Don Lemon Following Minnesota Church Incident — Don Lemon attends the 2023 Center Dinner at Cipriani Wall Street in New York on April 13, 2023. (Cindy Ord/Getty Images)

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is moving toward charging anti-ICE protestors, along with broadcaster Don Lemon, under a Civil Rights-era statute originally enacted to combat the Ku Klux Klan, according to Harmeet Dhillon, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. This follows Lemon’s participation with a group that disrupted a church service in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Sunday, Jan. 18.

Dhillon said on Jan. 19 in an interview on the Benny Show that the DOJ is reviewing whether Lemon and other participants violated federal law, including provisions of the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871. The statute is part of the Civil Rights Act of 1871 and was enacted to empower federal prosecutors to pursue those who conspire to deny Americans their civil rights and to safeguard newly freed Black citizens from violence and intimidation.

Following the end of the American Civil War, vigilante groups like the Ku Klux Klan “freely threatened African Americans and their White allies in the South and undermined the Republican Party’s plan for Reconstruction,” according to the U.S. House of Representatives on History, Art, & Archives.

In response, the Ku Klux Klan Act made it a federal crime to deprive individuals or groups of their constitutional rights. It also gave the president broad powers to enforce the law. At the time, critics of the act argued the law infringed upon states’ rights and individual liberties.

Dhillon also referenced the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE), a 1994 federal law. According to the FACE Act, it is illegal to intentionally injure, intimidate, or interfere with, or attempt to injure, intimidate, or interfere, “any person by force, threat of force, or physical obstruction exercising or seeking to exercise the First Amendment right of religious freedom at a place of religious worship.”

Likewise, the law also states the same for “any other person or any class of persons from, obtaining or providing reproductive health services” or “intentionally damaging or destroying the property of a facility, or attempting to do so, because such facility provides reproductive health services, or intentionally damaging or destroying the property of a place of religious worship.”

The law imposes substantial fines. including for nonviolent physical obstruction, and carries maximum prison terms for violators.

Dhillon said that Lemon could be charged under the Ku Klux Klan Act on allegations that the former CNN host was not a neutral observer but “an embedded part of a criminal conspiracy” hiding under the shield that he was conducting journalism during the church disruption.

Don Lemon “said he knew exactly what was going to happen inside that facility. He went into the facility, and then he began 'committing journalism' as if that’s sort of a shield from being an embedded part of a criminal conspiracy. It isn’t,” Dhillon said, adding: “This is a very serious matter.”

“Next Sunday, nobody should think in the United States that they are going to be able to get away with this,” Dhillon said. “Everyone in the protest community needs to know that the fullest force of the federal government is going to come down and prevent this from happening and put people away for a long, long time.”

During a Jan. 19 IHIP News podcast, Lemon explained that “people who are in religious groups like that” do not represent the Christianity he practices, stating, “They think they are entitled, and that comes from a supremacy, a white supremacy.” He said he’s become the face of the church disruption because he was "the biggest name there." Lemon said that when he asked his producer why he was singled out, the producer replied, “You’re a gay Black man in America."

In a livestream of the church service disruption, Lemon and anti-ICE demonstrators entered Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, during a service while screaming, chanting, and confronting congregants, according to video widely shared on social media. Lemon approached the priest, attempting to interview him during a service.