Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) verbally sparred with Bill Maher on Friday after Maher condemned President Donald Trump and his administration over the arrest of former CNN host Don Lemon.
Maher, on his “Real Time” show Friday, was discussing the presence of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection agents in Minnesota, who killed two U.S. citizens earlier this month, noting, “That didn’t happen under [former President Barack] Obama.”
When he raised the news of Lemon’s arrest, an audience member yelled, “Yes!” Maher, taken aback, noted, “Somebody went, ‘Yes,’ like, ‘Good.’ I don’t know. It’s not good to arrest him.”
To which Greene replied, “Well, I’m going to say he violated the FACE Act.”
The Freedom of Access to Clinical Entrances (FACE) Act prohibits the use or threat of force to interfere with access to reproductive health services or places of religious worship.
Lemon was arrested in Los Angeles on charges related to his coverage of an anti-ICE protest on Jan. 18, when demonstrators interrupted a Sunday morning service at the Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota. He appeared to be at the scene to report on the protest.
“He went into a church, disrupted their worship and then later in an interview compared them to white supremacists,” said Greene, alluding to Lemon’s comments on the “I’ve Had It” podcast. “That’s not journalism. That’s activism.”
Maher then interjected, “But does it warrant getting arrested?”
Greene doubled down, arguing Lemon violated the FACE Act by “stopping people’s right to worship.”
Damian Dovarganes/Associated Press
She added, “And under the … administration [of former President Joe Biden], pro-lifers were sent to prison up to 11 years for praying in front of an abortion clinic and they were convicted under the FACE Act. So I don’t think that’s journalism.”
Maher sided with numerous other media personalities and journalists who view Lemon’s arrest as yet another disconcerting example of government overreach under Trump, and said: “OK, but can we just charge him with, ‘Not cool, man?’”
“I completely support his arrest,” replied Greene, who has notably broken with Trump and his administration over several issues last year before announcing her resignation from Congress.
Fellow guest MS NOW host Joe Scarborough argued that if anyone should be prosecuted at all, it should be “the people that went into the church, that were the protesters,” suggesting Lemon was simply doing his job as a journalist at the time.
“I think there has to be sort of a differentiation between if somebody’s going in there and saying, ‘I’m not with them. Can I ask you some questions?’ Because you’re going to have embeds in war, you’re going to have embeds in protests,” Scarborough added. “There’s no doubt, this was meant to scare other reporters, to scare other journalists.”