Attorney General Pam Bondi issued a stark warning during an appearance on Sean Hannity’s show as she outlined federal charges tied to a disruptive protest that prosecutors say escalated into an attack inside a Minnesota church.
“We are going to find you, and we are going to arrest you,” Bondi said, describing what she called a coordinated operation that moved beyond lawful demonstration and into a place of worship while services were underway.
Bondi said she has spent several days in Minnesota personally overseeing the investigation and the indictments connected to the incident. She stated that two additional arrests were made recently, bringing the total number of defendants to nine — including media figure Don Lemon — and said all nine were charged together in a single federal indictment.
According to Bondi’s account, the protest group forced its way into the church during active services, with hundreds of parishioners present. She said the congregation included families, elderly worshipers, and children in an upstairs nursery. Bondi described the moment as chaotic, alleging that congregants fled through side and rear exits, some slipping on ice outside as they tried to escape.
Bondi claimed one woman suffered a serious arm injury and was transported to the hospital. She also alleged that parents were temporarily blocked from reaching their children, and that children were heard crying as tensions rose. Bondi said investigators reviewed video from the incident, including a protester shouting that the church was “the house of the devil.”
She further alleged that Don Lemon had described the group as heading “on their way to a resistance” at the church — a phrase she said matched the evidence obtained during the investigation. Bondi also accused Lemon of blocking at least one person from leaving the building during the confrontation.
Bondi said the defendants are being charged under the federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, which she noted can also apply to interference with religious worship. She framed the prosecutions as part of a broader message that demonstrations crossing into houses of worship will be met with strong federal action.
“We don’t live in a third-world country. We live in the United States of America,” Bondi said. “You will have the right to worship safely and freely in a house of worship, whether it’s a church, a synagogue, a temple, a mosque.”
While protests have erupted across Minnesota in recent weeks amid wider political unrest, Bondi said the administration is drawing a firm line when activism moves into religious spaces. She stressed that her warning extends beyond Minnesota.
“If you protested, if you rioted in that church, we are going to find you, and we’re going to arrest you,” Bondi said. “We are going to protect houses of worship. This is not what our country was founded on.”
Bondi’s comments signal one of the most forceful federal responses so far to protest-related activity involving religious institutions, with the Justice Department portraying the case as both a prosecution and a nationwide warning: houses of worship, she said, are not battlegrounds.
