Don Lemon didn’t hold back when addressing Nicki Minaj after she directed a homophobic slur at him over his reporting on an anti-ICE protest held at a church in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Speaking with TMZ, the former CNN anchor — who is openly gay and married his longtime partner, Tim Malone, in 2024 — blasted the rapper, who has recently made her support for the Trump administration known. “She called me: Don, C-sucker Lemon. It’s disgusting,” he said. “I think Nicki Minaj has made it very clear how she feels about African-Americans in this country—I don’t think she’s one of them, obviously—and she should, under Trump’s rule, she should be deported because I don’t think, reportedly, that she is a legal citizen here. She is undocumented.”
Lemon claimed Minaj has “shown her disdain for African-Americans” and questioned why fans continue to back her despite what he described as her troubling alignment with far-right views.
“Why are you supporting this homophobic, bigoted, ignorant woman? You should not be supporting her. Nicki Minaj, this is clearly out of her depth,” he went on. “She doesn’t understand politics, she doesn’t understand journalism, and I’m not surprised that she is weighing in on something that is beyond her capacity. … She will do anything that is expedient for her politically, and again, she’s ignorant. She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. She’s always weighing in on things that she doesn’t know about.”
Lemon also pointed to Minaj’s marriage to Kenneth Petty, who was convicted of rape in 1995 and is a registered sex offender.
“Nicki Minaj should just sit the fuck down, and, by the way, isn’t she married to an alleged pedophile?” he said. “She has the nerve to say something disparaging, something homophobic? I’m pretty sure that maybe that’s part of the reason that she is cozying up to the Trump administration for some sort of leniency for her family members. And, it’s just very transparent. So, Nicki Minaj, eff off, stop being a homophobic bigot. And, you know, get a life and some brains.”
Lemon might have also been alluding to Nicki Minaj’s brother. In 2022, her brother Jelani Maraj was sentenced to 25 years to life after being convicted of raping an 11-year-old, according to USA Today.
Minaj erupted on X (formerly Twitter) after video of Lemon’s coverage from a protest at a church in St. Paul, Minnesota went viral. “DON ‘COCK SUCKIN’ LEMON IS DISGUSTING,” she wrote in all capital letters alongside an image of Chucky from the Child’s Play series. “HOW DARE YOU? I WANT THAT THUG IN JAIL!!!!! HE WOULD NEVER DO THAT TO ANY OTHER RELIGION. LOCK HIM UP!!!!!”
Lemon had been reporting from the Cities Church in St. Paul on Sunday, January 18, where tensions are running high following the fatal shooting of Renee Good by an ICE agent earlier this month — a death that has sparked ongoing protests in the Twin Cities area. Protesters disrupted the service there, chanting “ICE out” and demanding “Justice for Renee Good,” and accused one of the church’s pastors of having ties to the local ICE field office. Federal authorities have since launched an investigation into the incident under laws meant to protect places of worship.
In footage shared online, Lemon followed demonstrators through the church as they voiced their objections to federal immigration agents operating in the community. After clips of the protest spread widely, he pushed back against what he called “fake right-wing propaganda” suggesting he was leading the protest, stressing that he had no connection to the group organizing the demonstration and was simply there to report on and speak with people involved.
