Greene County Democrat

Tag: Attorney General Pam Bondi

  • Newswire : Don Lemon made the headlines, but Georgia Fort’s arrest shows no journalist Is safe

    A professional portrait of a woman in a pink blazer and a man in a tuxedo, both posing confidently against a grey background.

    Georgia Fort and Don Lemon

    By Stacy M. Brown
 NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent

    Famed journalist Don Lemon may draw the headlines, but Emmy-winning independent reporter Georgia Fort and Trahem Jenn Crews and Jamael Lydell Lundy were also taken into custody as federal agents moved against four Black journalists whose only apparent offense was documenting protests critical of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
    Lemon, a veteran broadcaster and longtime critic of President Donald Trump, was arrested late Thursday night in Los Angeles after livestreaming an anti-ICE demonstration connected to a January protest at a St. Paul, Minnesota, church. A short time later, Fort, a respected Minnesota-based journalist, was arrested by federal agents in her home state for reporting on the same protest, according to public statements and court records.
    Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said the arrests signal a dangerous escalation by the Trump administration rather than any attempt to ease tensions following the fatal shootings of civilians by federal agents in Minnesot. She said Lemon was simply doing his job when agents arrested him and stressed that Fort’s detention made clear this was not an isolated incident but a broader assault on press freedoma.
    Federal authorities revived charges tied to a protest at Cities Church in St. Paul after a magistrate judge had already declined to approve arrest warrants against Lemon and others, citing insufficient evidence. Prosecutors then pursued indictments through a grand jury, a move civil liberties advocates say appears designed to sidestep judicial scrutiny and chill coverage of protests against ICE operations.
    Fort documented her own arrest in a brief livestream as agents arrived at her door, telling viewers she was being taken into custody for filming the protest as a member of the press. Her arrest, announced publicly by Attorney General Pam Bondi, placed an Emmy-winning journalist alongside protesters in a case the administration has described as a coordinated attack.
    Civil rights leaders said the symbolism was unmistakable. Rev. Al Sharpton, founder and president of the National Action Network, said Lemon’s arrest marked a direct blow against the First Amendment and warned that journalists critical of the president were being singled out.
    Press freedom advocates echoed those concerns. Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen, said the arrests represent a constitutional crisis for journalism in the United States, adding that reporters have the right to document and share information with the public without fear of retaliation.
    Mayor Bass said she contacted the U.S. attorney to demand information about Lemon’s status and warned that arresting journalists for entering a church while reporting crosses a line the Constitution was written to prevent. “It’s an egregious assault on constitutionally protected First Amendment rights,” Bass said.

  • Newswire : Disturbing prank appears to be a growing trend Judges: Pizza deliveries are meant to intimidate

    Federal District Judge  Ether Salas, whose son was killed

    By Evann Gastaldo, Newser

     

    Federal judges have been receiving hundreds of unwanted pizza deliveries since February, and no, it’s not fueled by random acts of kindness. The judges say the pizza deliveries are threatening, and largely go to judges overseeing lawsuits that are challenging Trump administration policies, the Washington Post reports.
    Some have even been delivered to relatives of judges, and in a particularly chilling move, some have been placed in the name of Daniel Anderl—the son of US District Judge Esther Salas, who was fatally shot at the family’s New Jersey home in 2020 by an attorney masquerading as a FedEx delivery person. Senate Democrats are calling on the FBI and the Department of Justice to investigate the deliveries, Fox News reports.

    “What does that say to those judges?” Salas said in a television interview last month, per NJ.com. “It says I know where you live. I know where your kids live. And do you want to end up like Judge Salas? Do you want to end up like her son? These are unprecedented attacks on judicial officers.” One US Circuit judge who spoke to the Post says she’s personally received seven unsolicited deliveries over the past few months, including one just after she ruled against the Trump administration—an administration that has been brazen in its attacks on the judiciary.

    Reuters recently published a report on the threats judges have faced after ruling against the administration, including threats of violence targeting their families. Attorney General Pam Bondi said last week she was “just learning” about the pizza intimidation, the Washington Examiner reports.