US far-right influencer Jake Lang, known for his Quran-burning stunts, has been arrested on suspicion of rioting after clashes with counter protesters outside Minneapolis City Hall.
Lang spent four years in prison over the riot at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, before being pardoned by US President Donald Trump. This week, he announced what he described as a “crusader freedom of speech rally” in Minnesota’s largest city on Saturday.
BREAKING: Chaotic scene in Minneapolis as Jake Lang rides in the bed of a pickup truck outside city hall pic.twitter.com/fjvMqUIh4A
— Brendan Gutenschwager (@BGOnTheScene) August 22, 2026
The event was billed in support of Shiloh Hendrix, a white woman found guilty last month of disorderly conduct following a viral video showing her using a racial slur against an autistic black child at a playground in Rochester. She was fined $1,000, given a stayed 90-day jail sentence and one year of supervised probation, and ordered to perform 200 hours of community service.
Mayor Jacob Frey called on Lang’s opponents not to attend the “lame-a** racist rally” and urged them to avoid confrontation. “We don’t need to take the bait,” he said in a message on X on Thursday. Nevertheless, an angry crowd formed in anticipation of the event.
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Counterprotesters attempted to block the vehicles and clashed with Lang as police tried to separate the groups, resulting in chaotic scuffles.
According to 5 Eyewitness News, police arrested all seven occupants of the vehicles, including Lang, and later arrested four other individuals in connection with the clashes. A message on Lang’s official X account said he was “brutally assaulted” and taken “as a political hostage.”
In November 2025, Lang attempted to burn a copy of the Quran in Dearborn, Michigan, home to a large Muslim community, but was stopped by a counterprotester. He tried setting another copy of the Quran on fire outside a Dearborn mosque in May but was again stopped when someone sprayed it with a fire extinguisher.
In January, Lang held a demonstration outside the headquarters of the pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC in Washington, DC, with a banner reading “Make Jerusalem Christian Again,” and threw chocolate coins wrapped in gold foil.
