What did Donald Trump do today?

He called for jailing journalists covering protests, spreading misinformation in the process.

This morning, demonstrators entered a church in St. Paul, Minnesota to protest the ongoing campaign of terror by ICE agents in the Twin Cities. For the most part, clergy have been leading anti-ICE protests—and getting shot, arrested, and gassed for their troubles—but this one was aimed at the pastor of Cities Church, David Easterwood, who is also an ICE agent.

The demonstrators had alerted media, and a number of reporters followed them in to cover the protest, including CNN's Don Lemon. Neither Lemon nor any other member of the press took part. The Trump administration responded today by calling for Lemon's prosecution as part of a "conspiracy" and said he was "on notice" for federal charges, including a violation of the Ku Klux Klan Act.

Lemon, who is Black, responded in a statement: 

It’s notable that I’ve been cast as the face of a protest I was covering as a journalist — especially since I wasn’t the only reporter there. That framing is telling. What’s even more telling is the barrage of violent threats, along with homophobic and racist slurs, directed at me online by MAGA supporters and amplified by parts of the right-wing press.

If this much time and energy is going to be spent manufacturing outrage, it would be far better used investigating the tragic death of Renee Nicole Good— the very issue that brought people into the streets in the first place. I stand by my reporting.

Conspiracy, which is one of the crimes Trump is still liable to be prosecuted for when he leaves office, involves making a plan to commit a crime and then taking an action in furtherance of that plan. It is not a crime to know that a nonviolent demonstration will take place, or to see it happening.

For his part, Trump reposted a tweet by a small-time "influencer" who goes by MoniFunGirl, in which she claimed that anti-abortion protestors had gotten "40 years" for violating the same law Trump's DOJ was threatening Lemon with. 

 

 

After Trump's repost, the original poster corrected herself to "40 months."  

 

Trump's post remains up and uncorrected. 

Why does this matter?

• It's not a crime to protest or report on protesting. 

• Threatening and prosecuting reporters is what dictators do.  

• Presidents shouldn't spread disinformation and should care if they get caught doing it.