A year after Democrats elevated Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as a plausible heartbeat away from the presidency, his leadership is now under scrutiny amid a massive welfare fraud scandal and a conspicuous reluctance to confront left-wing lawlessness when it targets people of faith.
According to Western Journal, Walz has already opted against seeking a third term as governor, even as his state remains engulfed in the Feeding Our Future debacle, a multibillion-dollar welfare fraud scheme involving Somali-run learning centers that allegedly siphoned taxpayer funds on a staggering scale.
When the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice finally intervened to enforce immigration and fraud laws that his administration had conspicuously failed to police, Walz did not exactly welcome the help; instead, he threw numerous hissy fits of abundant verbosity and encouraged activists who took to the streets in what critics derisively recall as those Fiery But Mostly Peaceful Protests.
That pattern of indulgence toward radical activism was on full display again this past Sunday, when a group styling itself the Racial Justice Network stormed Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, disrupting a worship service in what appeared to be a direct challenge to federal civil rights protections for religious congregations. The spectacle was amplified by former CNN host Don Lemon, who not only provided a running, real-time narration of the disruption but also confronted one of the pastors over the churchs stance on immigration enforcement.
The activists stated grievance centered on the fact that another pastor at Cities Church had worked with Minnesotas Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office, a partnership that left-wing agitators now treat as a moral offense rather than a basic function of public safety and the rule of law. Lemon, for his part, asserted that this kind of in-your-face disruption is shielded by the Constitution, insisting that protesters are free to make people uncomfortable anytime, anyplace, a sweeping interpretation that would logically permit conservatives to start a LemonFinder app to track the former anchor in public and incite flash mobs to make him uncomfortable too, right?
Thats what the First Amendment says, according to constitutional scholar Don Lemon, the commentary noted with biting sarcasm, underscoring how the lefts expansive view of free speech tends to apply only when it is their own side doing the shouting. In reality, such conduct is constrained not only by a host of state and local ordinances against trespass and disorderly conduct on private property, but also by federal law specifically the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, or FACE Act, signed during the Clinton administration.
The FACE Act is widely known for its use against pro-life demonstrators near abortion facilities, a tool that Attorney General Merrick Garlands Justice Department wielded promiscuously during the Biden years to threaten peaceful activists with draconian prison terms. Yet the statute does not merely protect abortion clinics; it also explicitly safeguards religious worship, a fact that becomes highly inconvenient for those who cheer on disruptions of Christian services in the name of racial justice.
The law states in relevant part: Whoever by force or threat of force or by physical obstruction, intentionally injures, intimidates or interferes with or attempts to injure, 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 shall be subject to the penalties provided in subsection (b) and the civil remedies provided in subsection (c). With the application of other federal laws, the Biden administration was able to threaten pro-life advocates with a decade or more in prison, yet there has been no comparable zeal when the targets are churches and the perpetrators are left-wing activists.
Given that the invasion of Cities Church appears to fall squarely within the conduct the FACE Act was designed to prevent, one might reasonably expect the governor of Minnesota to condemn the incident in clear, forceful terms and urge protesters to respect houses of worship. Instead, Walzs office produced a perfunctory, two-sentence statement on Monday afternoon and only after Fox News pressed for comment.
The Governor has repeatedly and unequivocally urged protesters to do so peacefully. While people have a right to speak out, he in no way supports interrupting a place of worship, the statement read, a carefully hedged formulation that sounded more like a box-checking exercise than a serious rebuke of those who turned a Sunday service into a political stage. First thing: Two sentences? Dude. To quote your own tribe, do better, the commentary observed, capturing the frustration of many Minnesotans who see a pattern of selective outrage from their governor.
Second thing: I dont know that the characterization that Walz has repeatedly and unequivocally urged protesters to do so peacefully is anywhere near accurate, but to the extent it is, he has repeatedly and unequivocally urged protesters to protest harder, the piece continued, arguing that Walzs rhetoric has consistently emboldened the activist left rather than restrained it. That posture conveniently diverts attention from unresolved scandals like Feeding Our Future, where taxpayers in Minnesota and beyond remain on the hook for a sprawling fraud that flourished on his watch.
The current wave of protests intensified after the death of Renee Good, who managed to get herself killed by deciding she didnt have to follow an ICE officers orders and could simply drive her car away with another ICE officer in front of it. She was shot and killed, a tragic outcome that activists have seized upon to inflame tensions rather than encourage respect for lawful commands and due process. In the unrest that followed, again aided and abetted by Walzs rhetoric, the storming of Cities Church for clicks by activists and Don Lemon (as if the two groups were separate, but I digress) has become emblematic of a left that still hasnt learned from the Summer of Floyd.
For conservatives, the episode underscores a deeper concern: a two-tiered system in which federal power is unleashed against pro-life Catholics praying outside clinics, while those who disrupt Christian worship in the name of progressive causes receive little more than a shrug from Democratic leaders. Walzs tossed-off response, as the commentary put it, serves as yet another reminder that when it comes to protecting religious liberty and enforcing the law evenhandedly, the priorities of the modern Democratic Party are badly misaligned with constitutional principles and basic public order.
Walzs tossed-off response, in short, is more proof that Kamala Harris decision-making regarding who should be first in line for the presidency should a tragedy occur was far worse than Americas. For voters who still believe in equal justice, limited government, and the sanctity of religious worship, the events in Minnesota raise a pressing question: if this is how a would-be Vice President responds when churches are targeted, what confidence can Americans have that their freedoms will be defended when the stakes are even higher?
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