Videos from inside a Saint Paul church show worshippers rushing toward the exits as chanting protesters stream into the sanctuary and surround the pulpit.
Within days, one of those protesters, Chauntyll Allen, an elected member of the Saint Paul Board of Education, was taken into federal custody and charged with conspiracy to deprive others of their constitutional rights, according to reporting by Fox News. The target of the protest was a pastor who also works as an agent for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Now Allen’s actions inside Cities Church are colliding with her role overseeing a large urban school district.
What Federal Authorities Say Happened at Cities Church
Fox News, citing federal officials, reported that Allen was one of three people taken into federal custody after a group of anti-ICE protesters entered Cities Church in Saint Paul on a Sunday in mid-January. Many in the group recorded video as they moved through the building and into the main worship space.
In its account, Fox News described the incident as a group that “stormed” the church. Some of the recordings that spread online show people shouting at the pastor and others in the congregation, while some churchgoers appear to move quickly toward exits. There is no indication in the available reporting that weapons were displayed or that anyone was physically injured, but federal authorities concluded that the conduct warranted a civil-rights charge.
The charge described by Fox News, “conspiracy to deprive others of their constitutional rights,” generally refers to a federal statute that allows prosecutors to pursue people who agree to interfere with rights that are protected by federal law, such as the right to worship, vote, or use certain public facilities. Under 18 U.S.C. 241, the government can charge a conspiracy when “two or more persons conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person” in the free exercise of such rights.
Attorney General Pam Bondi says federal agents have arrested Nekima Levy Armstrong and Chauntyll Louisa Allen for the anti‑ICE protest that stormed Cities Church, charging them under the FACE Act and 18 USC 241.#CitiesChurch #ICE #FACEAct
🔗 https://t.co/yEf5oaV1VO pic.twitter.com/H0eEuHMnYU— The Christian Post (@ChristianPost) January 23, 2026
The specific theory the government is advancing in Allen’s case is not publicly detailed in the Fox News coverage, and this article has not independently reviewed the charging documents. It is not yet clear precisely which protected right prosecutors believe was interfered with inside the church, although the right to practice religion without intimidation is a common basis for similar charges.
Why the Church Was Targeted
In an interview with TMZ, Allen said the group learned that a pastor at Cities Church was an ICE agent through a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). That discovery, she argued, justified confronting him in his role as a religious leader.
Allen told TMZ the protest “needed to be done to get the message across.” She described ICE’s activities this way: “For us that’s just like, the lowest bar. It’s like, you know, you have these people in our community just terrorizing. Terrorizing our children and our women and our different immigrant communities. They’re arresting U.S. citizens and doing all this illegal stuff and all the way down to even the most graphic murder of Renee Good.” She then objected to the pastor’s dual roles, saying, “we have the head of this whole operation standing in a pulpit preaching to a congregation every Sunday morning, and so that was really just not OK with us.”
Allen also invoked her religious background, telling TMZ that her mother is a pastor and pointing to the biblical account of Jesus overturning tables in the temple as a frame for disruptive protest in a sacred space.
Former CNN host Don Lemon was present and, according to Fox News, filmed portions of the protest while also interviewing the pastor inside the church. Fox reported that the pastor eventually asked Lemon to leave. The presence of national media figures and the decision by protesters to record the event helped push the confrontation into a broader political debate.
An Elected School Board Member and Activist
Allen serves as clerk of the Saint Paul Board of Education, an elected position. She has been on the board since 2020, according to the Fox News report, and her official biography describes her as a “youth advocate and educator” who works on student equity initiatives. She is also listed as a member of the board’s African American Program Work Group and Equity Committee.
Outside the boardroom, Allen has been visible in Twin Cities activism. Fox News notes that she participated in demonstrations after the killing of George Floyd in 2020 and has been involved in Black Lives Matter organizing in the region. That activist history is part of what is now fueling disagreement over whether her church protest was a legitimate extension of her advocacy or an abuse of her position as an elected official.
A Republican Lawmaker Calls for Removal
Minnesota State Representative Elliott Engen, a Republican from Lino Lakes, used the arrest to criticize what he sees as politicized school boards in the Twin Cities metropolitan area. In an interview with Fox News Digital, Engen said, “Most of the school boards in the Twin Cities metro area, Ramsey and Hennepin County in particular, have become nothing other than activist boards. They’re no longer about serving the school, making sure that the budget is balanced, kids are served, and the education gap is closed, because we have the largest in the nation.”
Engen connected Allen’s conduct at the church to his broader opposition to what he describes as ideological content in Minnesota education policy. He argued that curriculum requirements related to LGBTQ topics, ethnic studies, and queer theory amount to “a constant push towards more ideological persuasions and activism.” Those curriculum debates are ongoing in Minnesota and are distinct from the federal case against Allen, but Engen used the church incident as an illustration of what he believes has gone wrong with school governance.
Pressed by Fox on what should happen to Allen now that she has been charged, Engen gave a blunt answer: “Convicted, prosecuted, taken off the school board, never allowed within 500 yards of a school again. That’d be what sane societies do.” Allen has not been convicted of any crime, and under U.S. law, she is presumed innocent unless and until prosecutors prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt.
Engen expressed frustration with what he views as a culture of self-promotion on school boards, telling Fox that he is tired of adults turning board positions into platforms for political activism rather than focusing on students and basic district operations.
District Response and Open Questions
Saint Paul Public Schools has acknowledged that it is aware of the federal case against Allen. “The district has been made aware of this incident and is following all applicable policies and procedures,” a district spokesperson told Fox News Digital. “Saint Paul Public Schools does not comment on pending legal matters.”
Fox reported that the directors of the Saint Paul Board of Education did not respond to its requests for comment and that Allen herself did not return multiple messages. No public statements from Allen beyond the TMZ interview are referenced in the available reporting.
Key questions now sit unresolved. It is not clear whether the board will consider censure, removal, or other action while the criminal case proceeds. Minnesota law does allow for different mechanisms to address alleged misconduct by public officials, but no specific process has been publicly announced in Allen’s case based on current reporting.
On the criminal side, federal prosecutors will have to establish that Allen and any co-defendants knowingly joined an agreement to interfere with the constitutional rights of others. The government’s evidence could include video footage from inside the church, testimony from congregants and church staff, and any planning communications investigators obtained. None of that evidence has been filed in a way that is described in the Fox or TMZ coverage.
Allen, for her part, has framed the protest as a moral response to what she describes as community harm caused by ICE. Her critics argue that bursting into a church service crossed a line from protest into intimidation. Whether a federal jury eventually agrees that a crime occurred, and how the Saint Paul school district chooses to respond in the meantime, will determine whether this stays a flashpoint in a single congregation or becomes a lasting test of how far elected officials can go in their activism.
