Far-Right Provocateur Jake Lang Chased Out of Minneapolis During Hate Rally

Minneapolis, MN — Thousands of counter-protesters gathered on Jan. 17 in downtown Minneapolis outside the City Hall, quashing an Islamophobic rally before it was able to even begin.

Edward Jacob “Jake” Lang, the rally’s organizer, was chased multiple blocks from City Hall to the Hotel Indigo. Protesters chased him through the lobby and out the back, where a red Tesla picked him up.

The rally was set to begin at noon at Minneapolis City Hall, with a Quran burning at 1 p.m. followed by a march on the city’s Cedar Riverside neighborhood, home to a large population of Somalis. Minneapolis had been a target for Lang since his appearance at a protest in Dearborn, Michigan, where he held a similar event but was ultimately able to leave unscathed.

Lang came to notoriety in the wake of Jan. 6, 2021, when he was arrested and charged with attacking Capitol police with a baseball bat. Lang was one of the many violent offenders from that day to receive a full pardon from President Donald Trump, and since then, he has been touring the country and holding hate rallies alongside running for Marco Rubio’s former U.S. Senate seat in Florida.

Two days prior, Lang posted on X that “Americans Against Islamification (AAI) will be holding a CRUSADER MARCH on ‘Little Somalia.” Media companies like USA Today have reported in the aftermath that the event was titled the “March Against Minnesota Fraud” protest, which is untrue since Lang himself has made clear this was a march against Islam.

But the naming highlights part of its controversial origins. While the anti-Islam aspect had been solidified back in November, the event picked up new meaning after the release of right-wing influencer Nick Shirley’s video, where he purports to uncover fraud at Somali daycares in Minneapolis. While the video proved none of its claims and increased targeting of the city’s Somali community by the federal government, the Muslim identity of most Somali people fit neatly into Lang’s anti-Islam “crusade.”

Jake Lang’s Campaign of Terror [Jan.16, 2026]

Lang has made his political stances clear, shouting them through megaphones and microphones to draw crowds so he can post videos of the reactions to X or other social media platforms. At the Whipple Federal Building on Jan. 9, he told protesters he was “further to the right than the Nazis” and that non-white people should be deported regardless of citizenship to preserve the white race. Yesterday he doubled down on that call and added, “deport the white liberal women.”

Counter-protesters were gathered at the north west corner of South Fourth Street and Fourth Avenue South before noon. Shortly after, Lang arrived with a pet carrier slung around his shoulder holding a wireless speaker playing Vanilla Ice’s “Ice Ice Baby” and a small entourage of people carrying signs, such as one referencing the “Quality Learning Center” from Shirley’s video.

The signs were destroyed by protesters and Lang was quickly boxed into a recessed window of City Hall, where he would remain for close to an hour as protesters chanted “leave” and hurled water balloons and snowballs at him.

Less than a dozen protesters heeded Lang’s call and showed up for the march. Alongside him was Gregor Butzow, who appeared at the Whipple Federal Buildling three times in the past week, and Kristina Olson, a member of the Asatru Folk Assembly, which shares membership with the Blood Tribe Neo-Nazi group. Lang’s attendees and Lang himself exhibited violence toward the crowd on multiple occasions.

Gregor Butzow, left, and Kristina Olson, right, argue with counter protesters in front of City Hall in Minneapolis. Photo contributed by Elliot Madsen.

As 1 p.m. rolled around, with Lang still cornered, the crowd of counter protesters swelled into the thousands. At this point, Lang was now inaudible over music playing from wireless speakers, megaphones and chanting.

Well beyond the time Lang planned on burning a Quran, he was dragged from the window ledge into the crowd, where Black and Muslim men protected him and shepherded him away from the crowd as punches were thrown.

“When they crucified [Jesus] on the cross, he still forgave everybody for their sins,” one of the men said after the fact, standing outside the hotel he escorted Lang to. “We can’t treat hate with hate.”

Blood pours down the back of Lang’s head from an injury allegedly sustained after a counter-protester hit him in the head with a wooden flag pole. Photo contributed by Elliot Madsen.

The crowd followed him back to the Hotel Indigo, punching him and kicking him along the way as he was being held and protected by others. Protesters and media chased him through the hotel lobby and out the back, where he was able to flag down a red Tesla that allowed him to get in the back seat.

It was later revealed that the co-pilot of the Tesla was a trans woman. According to her, they drove him several blocks as he repeatedly claimed Trump saved him and that he’s been “a bad boy.”

“He’s so lucky we stopped for him,” she said. “He’s so lucky we did not know who he was because I’m sorry but you’re for the streets. We’re letting the wolves have you next time.”

Later in the day, right-wing journalist Cam Higby posted on X an image of the wound Lang received to the back of his head during the rally, which allegedly resulted from a protester striking him with a wooden flag pole.

Lang also claimed on X that a counter-protester tried to stab him in the crowd, but that the armored vest he was wearing blocked the attack. Despite the claim, no proof has been provided to back it up.

In an interview with Alex Jones the next day, Lang claimed to have had about 100 people RSVP for the event, but very few people showed up.

“The Proud Boys, the Oathkeepers, the Three Percenters, the Boogaloo Boys, the American patriots watched a white, Christian conservative get lynched, and nobody was there to stand up for me,” Lang said, signaling heavily at militia groups.

A close-up of Jake Lang as he is being escorted away from the crowd of counter-protesters. Photo contributed by Elliot Madsen.

Sympathy for Lang has not been forthcoming from fellow J6ers. Tim Hale, a nonviolent offender who lived in the D.C. prison alongside Lang, wrote in an X post that Lang would specifically target and harass former Oath Keepers leader Jessica Watkins for being transgender, resulting in half the ward having to “threaten to beat him unconscious.”

Hale identified the irony of this with Lang ultimately being rescued by a transgender woman.

“Jake Lang is a scumbag and doesn’t deserve any pity,” Hale wrote. “The right wing influencers…who are making him out to be a victim, are clowns selling the public a burning bag of dogshit.”

The remaining protesters rallied in the street outside the hotel, where Minneapolis Police Department officers arrived in an armored car with an LRAD sound system, telling protesters to leave the street or chemical weapons would be deployed to disperse them.

The orders by the police were largely ignored by the press and some of the protesters who remained in the street. After a short while, the armored vehicle drove off, and the crowd broke off into a march several blocks through downtown Minneapolis, back to the Government Plaza. The majority of protesters would remain there, forming an impromptu anti-ICE rally.

In addition to Lang, several other rally attendees were chased out of downtown by community members. One received a head injury similar to Lang’s after a counter-protester hit him repeatedly in the head with a wooden flag pole while he searched a parking garage for his car. Once he found his car, his friend sped off down the exit ramp and hit one of the counter-protesters.

A block away, another rally attendee who was seen earlier in the day wearing a Customs and Border Patrol hat, shouting his support for ICE into a megaphone, was chased down by counter-protesters after they saw him running from them. One of the counter-protesters punched him in the head, causing him to fall onto the sidewalk, where he hit his head.

Another counter-protester arrived and told the others that he was with them and not with Lang, and while they spoke, an unmarked white van full of Hennepin County Sheriff’s deputies pulled up with firearms ready. They brought the man into the van and drove off.

No arrests were reported.