Former CNN anchor Jim Acosta claimed on Friday that President Donald Trump\u2019s administration arrested Don Lemon because of his race.<\/b>
\nFormer CNN anchor Jim Acosta claimed on Friday that President Donald Trump\u2019s administration arrested Don Lemon because of his race.
Federal authorities arrested Lemon in Los Angeles, California, on Thursday night in connection with the disruption of a religious service at Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Jan. 18. Acosta argued on \u201cThe Jim Acosta Show\u201d that Trump\u2019s administration is only targeting Lemon simply because he is black, not because he may have committed a crime.
\u201cTrump likes to fuck with Don because Don is black, and we just need to say that too. Trump is racist and he\u2019s always attacked Don in racially loaded ways, calls him stupid and things like that and it\u2019s disgraceful, it\u2019s disgusting,\u201d Acosta said.
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Lemon live-streamed himself entering the church along with the protesters, who organized a demonstration against the pastor for also serving as an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer. He maintained that all he did was \u201ccommit an act of journalism\u201d by going inside, though Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon previously said his prior knowledge of the protesters\u2019 plans could implicate him.
Acosta also asserted that Lemon went to Minneapolis, Minnesota, for journalistic purposes and that the Trump administration took advantage of that to \u201cfuck\u201d with him.
\u201cEverybody needs to get pissed off, you know, everybody needs to take to the streets, everybody needs to get online, get on social media, talk about how they support Don, how they\u2019re gonna stand up for Don,\u201d Acosta continued. \u201cAnd, you know, this is not some social media thing where Don\u2019s doing this for clicks or any of that bullshit. Don went there to cover the killing of an American citizen by ICE and was covering a protest and then the federal government said, and the Trump people said \u2018oh, here\u2019s a way to fuck with Don. We\u2019ll fuck with him this way.\u2019 They went in search of a technicality that they think is a viable and legal case, and it\u2019s just not.\u201d
Lemon is being charged with Conspiracy to Deprive Rights and Violation of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act and interfering by force of someone\u2019s 1st Amendment rights, a source with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told The Los Angeles Times.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) also arrested Trahern Jeen Crews, Georgia Fort, and Jamael Lydell Lundy in connection with the incident. Before these arrests, federal officials also arrested Chauntyll Louisa Allen, Nekima Levy Armstrong and William Kelly on Jan. 22.
The protesters stormed into the church during a service and shouted, \u201cJustice for Renee Good,\u201d who was fatally shot by an ICE agent on Jan. 7 after hitting him with her vehicle. The agent suffered from internal bleeding in the torso as a result of the incident.<\/p>\n