OPINION:
The malevolence of the left’s agitation against immigration enforcement came to light over the weekend. As Christians gathered at Cities Church in St. Paul to pray during a Sunday service, an unruly rabble barged in to shout vapid, anti-ICE slogans.
Worshippers found themselves surrounded by this “surprise operation,” carefully staged for the cameras. The uninvited pests said they heard an ICE agent sometimes serves as a pastor, as if that justified an invasion.
Don Lemon wants us to believe he didn’t know in advance what was going to happen as he streamed his “resistance protester” buddies live on YouTube. When the pastor respectfully asked him to leave the property, the former MSNBC host remained.
Such actions appear to be addressed in the FACE Act, a federal law meant to protect abortion clinics. Although it ought to be repealed, the statute has a salutary provision targeting those who “intimidate or interfere with any person lawfully exercising or seeking to exercise the First Amendment right of religious freedom at a place of religious worship.”
Because the hecklers effectively shut down the church, Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon was convinced it was worth dispatching a team of prosecutors and FBI agents to the scene of the crime.
“There is no more sacred right in our Constitution than the right to assemble and pray to God, and there are federal laws that protect that right. What happened here was a shameful exercise in virtue signaling, disruption, fear, terror. You can see children in this video being ushered out the back by their mothers,” she said on Newsmax.
Ms. Dhillon noted that the previous administration applied the FACE Act against people of faith quietly protesting outside abortion facilities. The current Justice Department, by contrast, hasn’t done much, if anything, to rein in far more destructive political agitators.
That must change, and fast, because these aren’t spontaneous events. They are choreographed and funded for maximum effect, a point the White House understands.
Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller said so on X: “If you are surprised to see such a large volume of professional class leftists acting in psychotic fashion in response to routine immigration enforcement, remember the conduct of this same group during covid: masking babies, terrifying children, boycotting family, shuttering schools, purging dissenters, and signaling their ‘virtue’ to in-group peers with ever more extreme, painful and draconian measures.”
Pliable liberals have been whipped into such a frenzy that they have abandoned propriety, and it will only get worse. Violent outbursts will multiply unless the operation’s masterminds are exposed and put on trial.
For Republicans, the consequences couldn’t be more serious. Hakeem Jeffries is the top Democrat in the House with a fair shot at being elevated to speaker next January. He vowed to lock up conservatives over immigration enforcement.
“Reminder: To all members of the Trump administration. The incitement and engagement in state violence against the American people is a serious crime. Donald Trump will leave office long before the five-year statute of limitations expires. You are hereby put on notice,” Mr. Jeffries wrote about ICE efforts in Minnesota and elsewhere.
Unlike Republicans, when Democrats threaten to jail their political enemies, they follow through. Just ask Mr. Trump’s aides, such as Peter Navarro and Steve Bannon. Or ask the dozens of unsung staffers who accumulated six-figure legal bills while fighting for their freedom.
Rounding up the kingpins fomenting rebellion in Minnesota is a matter of self-defense.
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