Cities Church pastor urges state leaders, rioters to repent

The lead pastor of Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, urged the state’s politicians and those involved with the left-wing mob that recently stormed his church to repent and believe the Gospel during a Monday interview.

“One thing I think that we have in common, with at least some of the people who came into our building, is that we’re heartbroken over what’s happening in our cities right now,” the Rev. Jonathan Parnell said during an interview on “Fox & Friends.”

???????? BREAKING: The head pastor at Cities Church, where Left-Wing agitators stormed a Sunday Service perecuting Christians at Worship. Calls for Tim Walz and Minnesota mayors to FIND GOD.

PARNELL: “We need healing. We believe that healing comes in Jesus Christ.”

“My message to… pic.twitter.com/3fwLRFM9Gl

— The Patriot Oasis™ (@ThePatriotOasis) January 26, 2026

On Jan. 18, Parnell was delivering a sermon based on John 13 about loving one another when a mob of left-wing agitators, accompanied by former CNN host Don Lemon, stormed the service to protest that David Easterwood, one of its pastors, who also serves as the acting director of the ICE St. Paul field office.

They called on Easterwood to resign amid ICE’s crackdown on illegal immigration in Minnesota’s capital region, and shouted slogans in the faces of the churchgoers, forcing the service to end.

According to a U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) affidavit that went viral over the weekend, families and children at Cities Church were left traumatized when the agitators blocked parents from accessing their children in Sunday School.

Activist William Kelly, who was one of the three arrested last week before being released by a judge, reportedly screamed in the face of crying children that their parents were Nazis and were “going to burn in Hell.”

Joined by Renee Carlson, an attorney with True North Legal who is representing Cities Church, Parnell emphasized on “Fox & Friends” that Jesus Christ is the only solution to the chaos roiling the Twin Cities and the U.S. generally. The city continues to be the epicenter of turmoil over federal immigration enforcement operations after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old. 

“There’s a lot of pain in our cities, and we need healing,” Parnell said. “We’re asking for God to send healing, and we believe that healing comes ultimately in Jesus Christ, and so what I preach, what we preach, is that God so loved the world that He sent His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him, will not perish, but have everlasting life.”

“So my message to those agitators, my message to the governor of our state, to the state attorney general, my message to both mayors of our cities, is to turn from your sin, trust in Jesus Christ and be saved. He is our only hope.”

Carlson, Parnell’s attorney, noted that Cities Church is weighing potential legal options against the anti-ICE protesters.

“The church is prayerfully considering what their next steps are to be sure that Cities Church and the members of Cities Church remain protected, as well as every church across the state,” Carlson said. “In Minnesota, we have to make sure this does not happen again to anyone in a holy sanctuary and a house of worship.”

Three of the protesters — Nekima Levy Armstrong, Chauntyll Louisa Allen and Kelly — were charged by the U.S. Department of Justice last week under 18 U.S. Code § 241, also known as “Conspiracy against rights.” Carlson condemned Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison for allegedly being “completely hostile in this situation” and “siding with agitators.”

Ellison has defended the church protesters, telling Lemon in an interview last week that their actions were protected under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

“Chanting cannot be a crime; it’s freedom of expression,” Ellison said.

Parnell said Lemon was mistaken in thinking he had “a press pass” to violate the FACE Act, which prohibits disrupting a religious service. Lemon’s charges from the DOJ were reportedly blocked by Judge Douglas L. Micko, a federal magistrate judge whose wife works as Assistant Attorney General in Ellison’s office.

Last Friday, a three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected an emergency petition from the DOJ seeking to arrest Lemon and four others, upholding an earlier lower court ruling.

Circuit Judge L. Steven Grasz, a Trump appointee, authored a brief concurring opinion stating that “the government has failed to establish that it has no other adequate means of obtaining the requested relief.”