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“I have a responsibility, not only as a journalist but as an American, to tell the truth, and to abide by the promises of the Constitution,” said then-CNN prime-time anchor Don Lemon on his responsibilities as a journalist.
“If you’re going to be in the business of news and telling people the truth, you’ve got to be honest,” Lemon also once said. “You’ve got to have the same rules for yourself as you do for everyone else.”
“I don’t consider myself a celebrity, I’m just a journalist,” is another great Lemon line.
When looking at the comments Lemon has made over the years in attempting to brand himself as an objective journalist speaking truth to power, one must ask: Does he actually believe his own bulls***?
The one-time “anchor” of Don Lemon Tonight and CNN This Morning was fired from CNN approximately two years ago after 17 years with the network. The termination was justified after Lemon, 59, said that then-GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley was past “her prime.” Haley, who was 53 at the time, is obviously younger than Lemon, who apparently isn’t past his prime, in his own mind.
“Nikki Haley isn’t in her prime,” Lemon claimed in 2023 shortly before his firing. “Sorry. When a woman is considered in her prime in her 20s and 30s.”
“Prime for what?” co-host Poppy Harlow asked incredulously.
After somehow explaining that his misogynist and warped perspective was “not his opinion,” Lemon proceeded to insist it was a scientific fact, at least according to Google.
“If you Google ‘when is a woman in her prime,’ it’ll say 20s, 30s, 40s.”
Actually, that depends on the question. If we’re talking “physical prime,” then a woman in her 20s or 30s is a logical answer. However, when asking a more relevant inquiry around “emotional prime,” here’s what it spits out: “Emotional maturity and self-awareness often increase in the 40s and 50s, leading to a sense of fulfillment and purpose. Overall, the concept of a woman’s prime is subjective and can vary based on individual experiences and life stages.”
But for Google, the most accomplished woman of the 20th century, from a political perspective, was Margaret Thatcher, who became prime minister of England at the past-her-prime age of 53 and stayed there until age 65. In Lemon’s world, she had no business being in that position.
Fast forward to last weekend, when a group of anti-ICE far-left agitators stormed a Sunday church sermon in Minnesota. And the rhetoric directed toward these people who simply gathered to nourish their faith, learn from the Bible’s teachings, and pray peacefully was downright nasty and hateful. And at the center of it all was Lemon, who lectured the pastor on a citizen’s right to disrupt such services under the guise of the First Amendment.
Pastor: “This is unacceptable. It’s shameful to interrupt a public gathering of Christians in worship.”
Lemon: “Listen, there’s a Constitution, the First Amendment, freedom of speech, and freedom to assemble and protest.”
Pastor: “We’re here to worship Jesus because the hope of the world is Jesus Christ —”
Lemon: “But did you try to talk to them?”
Pastor: “No one is willing to talk. I have to take care of my church and my family, so I ask that you would also leave this building.”
Let’s unpack Lemon’s argument for a moment regarding “the First Amendment, freedom of speech, and freedom to assemble and protest.”
If he did even one ounce of homework despite being in this business for more than three decades, he would know that the freedom to assemble and protest does not pertain to private property or religious gatherings. The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, passed by Democrats and Republicans in 1994 during the Clinton administration, strictly prohibits protests on religious property.
The FACE Act “amends the Federal criminal code to prohibit: intimidating, or interfering with, or attempting to injure, intimidate, or interfere, any person by force, threat of force, or physical obstruction exercising or seeking to exercise the First Amendment right of religious freedom at a place of religious worship.”
Seems pretty straightforward. Apparently, Lemon understands what kind of legal and criminal trouble he’s in here, so he attempted to excuse himself by stating he had no idea such a storming of a church was going to take place.
“I didn’t even know they were going to this church until we followed them there,” Lemon said. “We were there chronicling protests. Once the protest started in the church, we did an act of journalism.”
Didn’t know that they were going to this church, huh? Then why exactly was Lemon filming himself handing out coffee and doughnuts to the protesters moments before they entered the church? Why did he interview the head of the group beforehand, who told him exactly what they planned to do? Why did he kiss the head agitator, Nekima Levy Armstrong, at the end of the interview? And most importantly, out of the thousands of churches Lemon chose to visit that morning, why was this nondescript gathering chosen?
With no legitimate excuses to get himself out of this, Lemon played the one card he’s built his entire sorry career off of. And he played that race card from the bottom of the deck.
“I think people who are in religious groups like that, it’s not the type of Christianity that I practice, but I think they’re entitled, and that entitlement comes from white supremacy,” Lemon said during an interview with podcaster Jennifer Welch, a woman who once implored Democratic lawmakers to embrace Charlie Kirk’s assassination as a good thing.
President Donald Trump, who called Lemon “the dumbest person on television” during his first term, called on Lemon to be prosecuted under the FACE Act.
“A small group of elderly ladies were protesting at an abortion clinic and were given 40 years in prison for violating the FACE Act,” Trump wrote Monday on Truth Social. “I would like to see the same kind of sentence of Don Lemon and the people that broke into the church and did that during services.”
By getting the attention of the president and the press, Lemon, an attention-seeking narcissist, is getting exactly what he wants out of this: 15 minutes of relevance. He even claimed his producers told him the following, which sounds completely made up:
“Don, you’re a gay black man in America, and you have a platform. And you’re the biggest name. Of course, you’re going to be the person they single out. And they’re gonna make the headline because it plays to their base. And their base is full of racist, bigoted homophobes.”
Yep. A producer totally told Lemon that, as if it was almost scripted, in checking off every box of victimhood in the book:
Lemon is gay, black, and a journalist. Trump supporters are racist, bigoted, and homophobic.
For Lemon, this is his Jussie Smollett moment. He’s just a target here because of his color and sexual orientation. He did it at CNN. He’s doing it again.
But this time, there will be consequences. Lemon broke the law. He lied repeatedly about his role. There are ample video clips he produced and distributed that will be used against him.
This is what many quarters of journalism have become: straight-up activism. And Lemon, once a recipient of both an Edward J. Murrow and Peabody award, was once again at the center of it in Minnesota. And now the Justice Department has also announced it will go after Lemon and the protesters or agitators involved with the Ku Klux Klan Act as well.
“The Klan Act is a law that makes it illegal to terrorize and violate the civil rights of citizens,” Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dillon told podcaster Benny Johnson, while noting the Biden administration had used the Klan Act as a prosecutorial tool as well. “Whenever people conspire to do this, the Klan Act can be used.”
THE HUMAN COST OF THE MINNESOTA FRAUD SCANDAL
The irony couldn’t be any thicker: A guy who has been a race-baiter his entire broadcasting career is about to be indicted under the KKK Act.
So much for this former CNN D-list celebrity abiding by promises of the Constitution.
