Legislatures across the country are racing to upgrade penalties for disrupting worship services, with multiple Republican-led states introducing or signing bills that would make storming a church a felony offense.

The wave of legislation follows the anti-ICE demonstration that tore through Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, where a group burst into the sanctuary, chanting "ICE out" and shutting down Sunday worship.

Ohio, Oklahoma, Alabama, Idaho, and South Dakota have all moved in recent weeks. The message from GOP lawmakers is uniform: protest the government all you want, but houses of worship are off limits.

State by State, the Penalties Are Getting Steeper

In Ohio, Republican Reps. Tex Fischer and Johnathan Newman introduced HB 662, which would reclassify interfering with religious services from a first-degree misdemeanor to a fifth-degree felony, Fox News reported. Fischer pointed directly to the Minnesota incident as the catalyst. He drew a clear line between legitimate protest and what happened at Cities Church:

"While every American has the right to peacefully protest ICE or any other government entity, they do not have a right to storm into a place of worship and disrupt another American's right to freely practice their religion."

Fischer also framed the legislation as a matter of basic security for families:

"We cannot allow our country to be a place where families fear they may face harassment or see their religious services disrupted by activists attempting to score political points while attending church on a Sunday morning."

Oklahoma moved even faster. Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt signed into law a bill that strengthens penalties against demonstrators who disrupt church services and creates a buffer zone around worshipers for additional protection.

Alabama's House is preparing to vote on a bill that would make entering a church with the intent to disrupt a service a Class C felony. First-time violators could face up to 10 years in prison.

Idaho has taken a different approach, proposing to add churches and religious services to the state's existing "disturbing the peace" law, which currently covers neighborhoods, families, and individuals. Violations under the existing statute carry up to a $1,000 fine and six months in prison.

South Dakota's Two Attempts Tell a Revealing Story

South Dakota has wrestled with two separate bills this year, and the contrast between them is instructive. The first, introduced by a Republican lawmaker, attempted to create a 50-foot perimeter around places of worship with a one-hour buffer before and after services. That bill failed over First Amendment concerns.

The second, filed by Republican Gov. Larry Rhoden, has gained considerably more traction. Rhoden's bill would reclassify disrupting a church service from a misdemeanor to a felony, punishable by two years in state prison, a fine of up to $4,000, or both.

The trajectory here matters. South Dakota legislators recognized that perimeter restrictions might not survive constitutional scrutiny. So they pivoted to something narrower and harder to challenge: simply making the act of disruption itself a serious crime. That's not overreach. That's precision.

The Minnesota Incident That Started It All

Every one of these legislative efforts traces back to what happened at Cities Church. The disturbance there resulted in federal criminal charges against nine individuals, including former CNN anchor Don Lemon and another journalist. All were indicted on charges of allegedly conspiring to violate constitutional rights, along with violations of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.

The FACE Act, passed in 1994, prohibits intimidation or obstruction intended to "injure, intimidate, or interfere" with an individual's right to religious freedom at a place of worship or reproductive healthcare facility. On paper, the statute protects both. In practice, Republicans and pro-life groups have long criticized the law as being selectively enforced, with previous administrations directing its weight almost entirely at demonstrations outside reproductive healthcare facilities while largely ignoring threats to houses of worship.

That selective enforcement is exactly why state lawmakers feel the need to act on their own. If the federal government spent years treating the FACE Act as a one-directional weapon, states have every reason to build their own protections rather than trust Washington to suddenly discover the other half of a statute it ignored for decades.

Religious Liberty Isn't a Suggestion

Shortly after the start of his second term, President Trump pardoned 23 individuals who had been arrested for FACE Act violations, a move that acknowledged the law's history of lopsided application. The Justice Department has no official tally of individuals charged under the FACE Act in the more than 30 years since its passage, which tells its own story about how seriously previous administrations tracked its use.

What these state bills collectively represent is something larger than a reaction to one viral protest. They represent a recognition that the left's activist class has decided churches are fair game. That families praying on a Sunday morning are acceptable targets for political theater. That the sacred can be invaded if the cause feels righteous enough.

The First Amendment protects the right to protest. It does not protect the right to storm into someone else's sanctuary and commandeer their worship. Those are not the same thing, and no amount of activist rhetoric can blur the distinction.

State legislators across the country looked at what happened in Minnesota and reached the same conclusion: if existing law won't deter this, a stronger law will. The bills vary in their specifics. The principle behind them does not.

You can march outside a federal building. You can picket on a sidewalk. You can shout until your voice gives out. But the moment you cross the threshold of a church to silence someone else's prayer, you've left protest behind and entered something the law has every right to punish.