Federal prosecutors in Minnesota are cracking down on dissent

Is asking questions illegal? It depends on the circumstances, suggest federal prosecutors in Minnesota. Don Lemon, a former CNN anchor and frequent critic of President Donald Trump, did it the wrong way and was arrested and charged with infringing other people’s religious freedom.

On January 18th Mr Lemon (pictured) followed a group of protesters into a church in St Paul where they disrupted the service, objecting to the pastor’s other job as acting field director for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Mr Lemon, standing back from the fray, live-streamed it onto his YouTube channel. “So right now it’s kind of mayhem, we’re not part of the activists, but we’re here just reporting on them,” he says. As the protesters leave, he says that he imagines “it’s uncomfortable and traumatic” for the congregants and asks a protester whether she thinks she has actually helped her cause.

Seven protesters were charged, along with Mr Lemon and another journalist. The activists are accused of a “co-ordinated takeover-style attack”. Mr Lemon’s criminal part, the indictment says, is that he “approached the pastor”, “stood in close proximity to [him]” and “peppered him with questions”. This, federal prosecutors allege, was not reporting, protected by the First Amendment, but an attempt to “oppress and intimidate”.

A federal magistrate initially rejected the charge against Mr Lemon. A grand jury then agreed to it. After being charged, Mr Lemon says he offered to turn himself in for booking. Instead, around a dozen federal agents appeared at his hotel, tackled and handcuffed him and hauled him away. “When life gives you lemons...” gloated the White House, in a post with a picture of Mr Lemon and an emoji of chains. Harmeet Dhillon, a US Assistant Attorney, retweeted a post calling Mr Lemon, who is black, one of “today’s klansmen”.

Mr Trump’s critics say this is yet another example of how he has weaponised the supposedly impartial Department of Justice against those who annoy him or try to thwart his policies, from unco-operative central bankers to Democrats who have investigated the Trump Organisation for fraud. In Minnesota, where the killing of two protesters by federal immigration agents has sparked widespread civil disobedience, the administration has made some concessions to its critics, such as announcing that it will reduce the number of agents deployed there. But it is also cracking down hard on what it calls “agitators”.

Many protesters in the city have been arrested by federal agents; some have been held for hours. On January 28th Pam Bondi, the attorney general, posted the mugshots of 16 protesters—she called them rioters—arrested in the city and charged.

All this is “unusual” and “concerning”, says Sharon Fairley, a professor at the University of Chicago who previously worked as a federal prosecutor. It “seems intended to quell speech” and to “stop people from protesting”, she says. The cases may be dismissed before reaching trial. However, being arrested and charged is in itself a punishment, says Ms Fairley. “They have to go through the ordeal and expense of defending themselves...which is no small matter.”

Mr Trump’s new commander of immigration raids in Minnesota, Tom Homan, says that agents will prioritise arresting violent criminals, rather than just anyone who is in the country illegally. But plenty of non-criminal foreigners are being rounded up. And the operation is in some ways weakening the forces of law and order. Since the start of the year, 14 prosecutors from the US attorney’s office in Minnesota have either resigned or are in the process of doing so. The criminal division now has fewer than 20 lawyers, down from around three times that number in 2022.

On January 3rd one federal lawyer, Julie Le, when asked by a judge why the administration keeps missing deadlines to comply with court orders, responded: “I wish you would just hold me in contempt, your honour, so that I can have a full 24 hours of sleep...The system sucks. This job sucks.”

Anders Folk, a lawyer who previously served as the acting US attorney for the federal district of Minnesota, says that before Mr Trump was elected, the office was among the most effective in the country. It prosecuted terrorism cases involving recruitment for al-Shabab, a militant group in Somalia, as well as serious fraud. Now, he says, “it’s not going to be able to do it.” Last year, nationally, only 0.2% of federal criminal cases resulted in an acquittal. Federal prosecutors do not usually take on cases they cannot win, he says.

That policy seems to have changed. In the past six months not a single federal prosecution of a protester nationally has resulted in a conviction. Some have been thrown out by grand juries, which used to be almost unheard of. When people are prosecuted for complaining about the government, it seems jurors have some questions of their own. ■