TL;DR
A federal judge ordered the DOJ to make all discovery disclosures in the Don Lemon FACE Act case by March 26 — civil rights attorneys doubt the evidence will survive scrutiny.
MSM Perspective
Newsweek reports the March 26 discovery deadline as a 'legal win' for Lemon after the judge rejected the government's bid for a complex case extension.
X Perspective
Press freedom advocates on X are framing Wednesday's deadline as the moment the DOJ must either produce real evidence or reveal the prosecution as political.
The federal clock in the Don Lemon case runs out on Wednesday. Judge Patrick Schiltz ordered the Department of Justice to make all discovery disclosures in United States v. Lemon by March 26 — a deadline the government tried and failed to push back. Lemon's attorney Abbe Lowell and co-defendants opposed the delay, arguing the DOJ was "charging first and investigating later." [1][2]
This paper reported in its March 23 edition that the government used Lemon's own livestream footage as the basis for FACE Act charges after he covered an anti-ICE protest at a St. Paul church. Lemon pleaded not guilty on February 13, calling the prosecution an assault on press freedom. On February 26, Judge Schiltz handed the defense a procedural win by rejecting the government's request for a complex case designation, which would have extended all deadlines by months. [3]
Wednesday's disclosure will force the DOJ to reveal the full scope of its evidence. Civil rights attorneys who spoke to Newsweek predicted the charges may not survive the discovery phase, noting that the FACE Act was designed to protect abortion clinic access, not to prosecute journalists documenting protests. The Cato Institute has questioned whether the statute is even constitutional as applied. [4]
No trial date has been set. The defendants' reciprocal disclosures are due April 2.
-- SAMUEL CRANE, Washington
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