Don Lemon and Nicki Minaj came for each other’s throats on Monday, and Barbie is standing on business behind her words. The Barbz and the Trump administration seem to be taking the same route as the rapper, digging into the Emmy-winning anchor with disses and even proposing charges. Meanwhile, Nicki’s latest message came after Don called her out for using homophobic language and being “out of [her] depth.”
Eyes have been on Minnesota for weeks as ICE raids and large-scale arrests started in late 2025. Tensions intensified between federal agents and local protestors after an agent fatally shot a U.S. citizen, Renee Nicole Good, on January 7. Days later, a Venezuelan immigrant was shot, too. Recently, Don Lemon was boots-on-the-ground reporting in Minneapolis, covering an anti-ICE protest at Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota. In viral footage, Don was seen interviewing one of the Christian establishment’s Lead Pastor, named Jonathan Parnell, per USA Today. Protestors had entered the church and disrupted service to confront a pastor they believed is allegedly working with ICE named Pastor David Easterwood.
Like some of the church attendees and Pastor Parnell, Minaj was not feeling the service disruption. In an X rant, Nicki Minaj went in on Don Lemon, adding a raunchy twist to his name that he later said was a homophobic slur. She even called for his arrest.
“DON C*CK SUCKIN LEMON IS DISGUSTING. HOW DARE YOU? I WANT THAT THUG IN JAIL!!!!! HE WOULD NEVER DO THAT TO ANY OTHER RELIGION. LOCK HIM UP,” Nicki wrote.
Ten hours later, she circled back to reshare a post challenging Don Lemon’s authenticity when he’s married to a white man. Lemon and real estate agent Tim Malone married in 2017. Nicki wrote, “True or False? #ArrestDonLemon” in that retweet.
In recent months, the ‘Pink Friday’ rapper has been vocal about Christian rights and persecution. She spoke at the United Nations about the alleged plight of persecution in Nigeria, and recently joined Charlie Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, on stage at AmericaFest 2025. She generously praised Trump at both appearances, from his policy to his “dashing” and “handsome” looks.
Don Lemon used a little more than a minute to dig into Nicki Minaj, challenging her to stop speaking on topics she knows nothing about. Additionally, he called her tweet “unhinged” and “homophobic.”
“You are a homophobic bigot. You don’t care about African-Americans; you’re not an African-American. From what I know, you are reportedly an undocumented citizen, so you should be deported under Donald Trump’s rules…” Don Lemon said in his response video, also calling out sex offenders in her family, which includes her convicted sex offender husband, Kenneth Petty and convicted child sex offender brother, Jelani Maraj.
With only a few seconds left, Don Lemon challenged Nicki Minaj’s nerve to speak on him. “Nicki Minaj, stop being a pick me. You should have put a Pick Me Doll on that damn tweet instead of a Chucky Doll because you are nothing but a pick me and I choose not to pick you and so should Black people, and so should gay people. Shouldn’t buy your music. Clock that,” he said.
On Facebook alone, Don Lemon’s video racked up over 25,000 comments and more than 3.9 million views.
A few minutes before Don Lemon clapped back, Nicki Minaj dropped three emojis on a retweet. Her repost seemingly signaled her support for the DOJ reportedly exploring charges against Lemon under the Ku Klux Klan Act. However, according to Minnesota AG Keith Ellison, neither the protestors who or Don Lemon broke any federal laws, including the KKK Act or FACE Act, by busting into the church and taking up space.
Meanwhile, Don has since explained that he was not involved in planning the disruption of the church service, but was instead covering it in live action after encountering the protesting group in St. Paul. In addition to interviewing protestors and a church pastor, he also interviewed parishioners who were less than happy about the political disruption.
Later on Monday, Nicki Minaj circled back with another Chucky meme. This time, the fictional doll was giving the middle finger in the photo. In her tweet, Nicki Minaj seemingly suggested that her description of Don Lemon the first time was intentional to generate news coverage. Also, she said that anyone angry, should be and is about be angrier.
“LOL!!! And I purposely wrote it that way b/c I knew that would be the only way to get the cock suckas to post about it. They wouldve all collectively ignored the despicable behavior displayed by Lemon head. Im glad theyre angry. Theyre about to get angrier,” Nicki wrote.
In an interview shared on Tuesday, Don Lemon went into more details with TMZ about his public beef with NickiThe host also said Nicki Minaj’s current approach is only going to enrage and divide people on social media whereas a “true Christian” would be trying to bring people together and “not be so divisive.”
“Honestly, I don’t think Nicki Minaj is that smart. What she’s smart at is creating outrage and doing things that are outrageous because that works for her. That gets attention for her. She doesn’t have the creativity and…the intelligence to do something in an articulate way to gain some real attention and to bring light to a subject.”
