Kamlager-Dove Leads 33 Lawmakers in Demanding Answers on the DOJ’s Charges Against Independent Journalist Georgia Fort

WASHINGTON, DC - Today, Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (CA-37) led 33 Members of Congress in demanding answers on the political prosecution of independent journalist Georgia Fort, who is a three-time regional Emmy-Award winner, the founder of BLCK Press, and a co-founder of the Center for Broadcast Journalism.

On January 18, 2026, following Renée Good's tragic death and the escalating immigration enforcement operation in Minnesota, Ms. Fort attended a protest at Cities Church in St. Paul to report on the demonstration. On January 30, 2026, federal agents arrived at Ms. Fort's home before dawn and arrested her in front of her children. She has been charged with three felonies, including a hate crime. The government does not allege that Ms. Fort committed any act of violence, made any threat, or physically obstructed any person.

"We are deeply familiar with the FACE Act and its purposes to protect the vulnerable from intimidation and violence, not to criminalize journalism.The current Administration has spent years criticizing the FACE Act as an example of federal overreach when it was used to protect reproductive health care access. It is now deploying that same statute against a Black woman journalist for documenting a protest," wrote the lawmakers.

"The Constitution guarantees journalists the right to report freely without fear of government retribution. The Supreme Court has held that political speech and press freedom receive the highest constitutional protection because "debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open"...That principle does not change because the journalist in question is covering a story the Administration finds unwelcome," continued the lawmakers.

"Reporting is not a crime. The prosecution of a journalist for bearing witness should concern every American who values a free press and the constitutional principles on which this country was founded," concluded the lawmakers.

The letter, which can be viewed in full here, requests that the DOJ respond to the following questions:

1. Since its enactment in 1994, how many times have criminal charges been brought under the FACE act against a journalist?
2. Please describe the Department's view of how Ms. Fort's conduct as a journalist has differed from the conduct of journalists who have covered anti-abortion threats and intimidation against women and doctors and why the Department has not brought criminal charges in those instances?
3. Are there other instances where Section 241 Conspiracy Against Rights charges have been brought against journalists? If so, please list them.
4. Charges under Section 241 were notably brought against Cecil Ray Price in Mississippi in 1965 for his role in orchestrating the kidnapping and subsequent murder of civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner as a Ku Klux Klan member. Please describe any ways in which the Department believes Ms. Fort's conduct is similar to that of Mr. Price.
5. What is the current status of any employee of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Minnesota who worked on the initial consideration of criminal charges against Ms. Fort? Have any of them been disciplined, reassigned or terminated because of their refusal to participate in the prosecution of Ms. Fort?

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