Former CNN host Don Lemon is pursuing a legal strategy that could have consequences beyond his own criminal case, including for a federal law long used to protect abortion facilities.
Lemon is facing charges stemming from a January incident at a Minneapolis-area church, where he joined a group that disrupted a worship service. The demonstration led to allegations that participants interfered with the rights of people attending the church, and Lemon was later charged with federal civil rights offenses.
On Aug. 7, Lemon appeared in court as his attorneys sought to have the case dismissed. His legal team has argued that the prosecution is politically motivated and that the charges amount to selective or vindictive enforcement by President Donald Trump’s administration.
But another part of Lemon’s defense has drawn attention because of its potential impact on the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, better known as the FACE Act.
Congress passed the FACE Act in 1994. The law makes it a federal offense to use force, threats or physical obstruction to interfere with people seeking or providing reproductive health services. It also contains protections for people exercising their religious freedom at houses of worship.
Lemon’s attorneys are challenging the portion of the law dealing with religious services as part of their effort to defeat the charges against him.
Jeremy Dys, senior counsel at First Liberty Institute, told the Daily Signal that such a challenge could create a much larger legal problem for supporters of the FACE Act. If a court were to strike down or seriously weaken the law’s protections for churches, Dys argued, that decision could potentially provide grounds for challenging other parts of the statute as well.
That possibility has created an unusual situation in which Lemon, a prominent progressive media figure, could end up helping undermine a law that has historically been used to protect abortion clinics.
“It would be one of the greatest ironies of the universe that it was Don Lemon that was responsible for invalidating the very law that was put in place to protect abortion clinics in this country,” Dys told the Daily Signal.
Dys also said he was surprised Lemon would pursue an argument that could threaten a statute frequently supported by abortion-rights advocates.
The FACE Act has been controversial for years, particularly among pro-life groups. Critics have accused the federal government of enforcing the law unevenly, depending on which political party controls the Justice Department.
During former President Joe Biden’s administration, conservatives frequently argued that FACE Act prosecutions disproportionately targeted pro-life demonstrators and sidewalk counselors accused of blocking or interfering with abortion facilities. At the same time, they complained that comparable federal action was less common in cases involving attacks or disruptions directed at churches and pregnancy resource centers.
Those longstanding objections mean some critics of the FACE Act may welcome a constitutional challenge to the law, even if they oppose Lemon’s attempt to have his own prosecution dismissed.
Lemon’s attorneys are also making a separate argument that the entire indictment should be thrown out because the case amounts to vindictive prosecution. According to CBS News, his legal team claims the Trump administration targeted Lemon because of his public profile and criticism of the president.
The court will now have to consider both the constitutional arguments surrounding the FACE Act and Lemon’s claims that the prosecution itself was improperly motivated. Depending on how the judge rules, the case could ultimately have implications reaching well beyond Lemon and the January church protest that led to the charges.