U.S. President Donald Trump welcomes Saudi Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman (not pictured) during an arrival ceremony on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., November 18 (REUTERS)
Independent journalist Don Lemon was arrested this morning. So was Georgia Fort, also an independent journalist. Both covered a January 18 church protest in Minneapolis. It’s unclear what they’ve been charged with.
It’s also unclear whether the federal agents who arrested them had the authority to. The US Department of Justice went to one judge. He said no. Then to another. He also said no. Then it went to a court of appeals. That panel said no, too. The Postquoted one of the judges: “There is no evidence that those two engaged in any criminal behavior or conspired to do so.”
Georgia Fort live-streamed her arrest this morning. She said federal agents at the door claimed to have in their possession an arrest warrant authorized by a grand jury “within the last day.” But, later this morning, the Post’s Carol Leonnig told MS Now that career federal prosecutors in Minnesota and Los Angeles refused to be involved in charging her and Lemon. Leonnig said the prosecutors said they don’t believe the evidence supports the charges.
It’s not even clear which law enforcement agency arrested them. Reports I have read say it was “federal agents.” In Fort’s live-stream, a masked man peers in the window. “DEA Police” is written on his vest. In that video, Fort demands to see the warrant. She is evidently shown. She then appears to say that it is not a “judicial warrant” – that is, a warrant ordered by a judge.
In normal times, I would give arresting authorities the benefit of the doubt. I would presume they went through proper channels. I would presume they would not want to blow up their criminal case with procedural mistakes.
We don’t live in normal times.
As things stand, it’s likely Lemon and Fort were arrested but not charged.
For those who react to all this with mocking and scorn, please consider the experience from Georgia Fort’s perspective. She doesn’t have Lemon’s celebrity. She doesn’t have his clout. She doesn’t work for a big media corporation with teams of attorneys ready to fight for her in court.
She’s a reporter who apparently believes in the mission of journalism to hold power to account. She’s a faithful person who acted on faith – that the First Amendment would protect her from those with enough power to silence her.
We all act on such faith. We believe the government would never arrest us without cause or authority. But that faith presumes a government acting according to law. It could be that Lemon was arrested because rapper and Trump ally Nicki Minaj said she wanted him put in jail after seeing his coverage of the church protest in Minneapolis. It could really be that stupid. The stupidity, however, is beside the point. The government really does have the power, but not the authority, to ruin you, me and everyone we know.
It has endless resources.
We don’t.
As Julian Sanchez said: “That the cases are meritless makes them more effective for intimidation. Prosecuting actual criminals sends no broader message. They’re saying: ‘P---us off and we’ll find some bull---- reason to tie you up in court whether or not we have any chance of making it stick.’”
There’s something else that’s beside the point – all the reasons the regime will give for why it had to arrest Don Lemon and Georgia Fort. It’s going to cherry-pick this and that fact about the January 18 church protest. For the sake of understanding, I recommend this excellent breakdown by Liz Dye.
In short, anti-ICE demonstrators stormed a white evangelical church during Sunday morning services to protest one of its leaders, a man who also decides immigration matters for the regime. The demonstrators claimed that he cannot preach “snatch thy neighbor” while also preaching the word of Jesus. Naturally, the congregants were outraged and objected. Lemon and Fort covered the whole thing, documenting a broad swathe of reactions.
Don’t get hung up on the details, though. Getting hung up on the details allows the regime to control the terms of debate. It wants us to ask whether the protesters, and by extension Lemon and Fort, violated congregants’ protected right to religious expression. It doesn’t want us to ask why the government thinks their religion trumps Lemon and Fort’s rights.
But if you can’t help it, see this detail from Judge Patrick Schiltz’s assessment. In accusing protestors of conspiracy to violate religious expression, he said “the government lumps all eight protestors together and says things that are true of some but not all of them. Two of the five protestors were not protestors at all; instead, they were a journalist and his producer.”
I can’t say I understand why the January 18 church protest triggered regime officials. That would require me to get inside their heads and I just took a shower. But, again, they don’t need legitimate reasons for using force. All they need to know is that Black anti-ICE demonstrators burst into a Christian nationalist church to school them on the real teachings of Christ, and Don Lemon and Georgia Fort, who are also Black, broadcast it to the world.
That said, their arrest is pretty clearly a reaction by the regime to the public condemnation of ICE and Border Patrol officers murdering Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti. In response, the regime said it was pulling back from the battle of Minneapolis. (Tom Homan called it a “drawdown.”) But with these arrests, it’s clear the president resents being forced to say sorry.
Elias Isquith explained in Donald Trump’s voice. “You made me pretend I care. You made me look weak. You made me feel small. I will not forget, and you will not be forgiven. I take it back. [Alex Pretti] was an insurrectionist. and your civil society actors? Your journalists and activists? They will be arrested, even on the thinnest pretext. And your heroes? the former leaders you think are untouchable? The red lines you think I won’t cross? F--- you.”
Instead of seeing a “drawdown,” we are seeing an escalation. This time, however, the regime is expanding the scope of conflict to include journalists, which itself is a continuation of a previous expansion. In the beginning, regime violence came only for nonwhite immigrants without documentation. Then it came for nonwhite immigrants with documentation. Then it came for nonwhite citizens. Then regime violence came for white citizens, too.
I don’t see why the regime wouldn’t eventually arrest a white reporter for the same reasons it arrested Lemon and Fort – because it can; because it’s petty and resentful – just as it eventually killed two white people after killing scores of nonwhite people. If that happens, it should come as no surprise to the media profession that authoritarianism did not stop at the color line.
But it will.