Jake Lang’s Campaign of Terror

Minneapolis, MN — Protesters raged at Department of Homeland Security officers lining the south driveway of the Whipple Federal Building in Minneapolis, shouting “Fuck ICE!” and blasting sirens and music over megaphones. The skies were clear and the air was dry, perfumed with the stinging smell of pepper balls from the last altercation.

To the east, a commotion. Suddenly, the entire media circus abandoned the protesters and scurried down the road toward a heart-shaped balloon and Vanilla Ice’s “Ice Ice Baby” playing over a portable speaker. Reporters fumbled over each other to bear witness to the source, unable to resist being pulled into its orbit.

Journalists able to elbow themselves to the front would see a man in his late 20s, dressed in an armored vest and shouting white supremacist slogans into his microphone, the speaker tucked away in a pet carrier slung over his shoulder. Two similarly aged men followed in his wake, wearing black dress coats and carrying flags.

They found the fight they came for: protesters pushed and shoved, shouted in their faces, stole their signs and their flags. One woman doused him with her water bottle.

“The violent left, everybody!” The man shouted into his phone, which he had out recording the whole time. He was trying hard to mimic the candor and mannerisms of the president, recoiling his head ever so slightly and gesturing with his free hand.

The DHS officers at the driveway entrance reacted quickly, firing pepper balls into the crowd and releasing tear gas. As they pushed the protesters back onto the sidewalk, the provocateurs filtered behind them, untouched. When the fumes settled, the officers were standing in front of the men as they continued their provocation, as if acting as their armed guards.

Protesters worked their way back into his orbit, confronting him one after another.

“Me? I’m an American,” He said in response to heckling from protesters, one calling him a Nazi. “I think we’re even further to the right than the Nazis were.”

The man with the microphone was Edward Jacob “Jake” Lang, who spent four years in federal prison for attacking Capitol police with a baseball bat and a stolen riot shield during the January 6 insurrection. Despite those offenses, Lang was one of many violent offenders from that day who received full pardons from Trump on his first day back in office.

Jake Lang, appearing at the Whipple Federal Building in Minneapolis on Jan. 9, 2026

Since his release, Lang has been on a rampage across the country, sparking violent encounters through racist and islamophobic rallies. Minneapolis has been in his sights at least since he appeared in Dearborn, Michigan, and since arriving he has wasted no time in making enemies. On Jan. 17, he is scheduled to bring his anti-Islam campaign to Minneapolis’ City Hall, an appearance counter-protesters are already preparing for.

His spree of media-magnet hate rallies come in the light of his candidacy for the U.S. Senate seat in Florida that was opened by the departure of current Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Lang first began to gain attention with his anti-Islam rally on Nov. 18 in Dearborn, Michigan, alongside truck driver and gubernatorial candidate Anthony Hudson.

Lang appeared on the scene in an RV with Hudson’s face plastered on the side alongside other right-wing provocateurs. In far-right influencer Nick Shirley’s video of the events, right-wing media personality Cam Higby uses the vehicle as shelter on at least one occasion.

Hudson said on the scene that he was not affiliated with Lang and did not give them permission to use his image on the RV.

Lang attempted to incite a crowd of mostly Muslim community members protecting their neighborhood into violence by first attempting to burn a Quran and then slapping a Quran with bacon.

Nearly a month later, on Dec. 13, Lang held a rally in Plano, Texas, against the construction of a new Mosque in the community. The basis for the rally was a widely-shared post on X, beginning with a post from End Wokeness on Nov. 16, stating that 48 mosques had been built in the Dallas area within the previous two years.

The evidence for the claim was a video of somebody zooming into Google Maps on their phone, with the location of mosques highlighted from the search menu.

At the start of 2026, Lang appeared in Washington, D.C., to hold a rally against the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, one that was sparsely attended except for the presence of media. Among his entourage were the two who would appear alongside him less than a week later in Minneapolis.

“Go back, AIPAC,” he said, throwing out a Nazi salute. “White Christian men are not going to sit around while you turn our children into a bunch of n***** lovers.”

Despite his Christo-fascist jockeying and rampant antisemitism, including videos of himself burning the Quran and the Talmud, Lang himself is Jewish.

A picture of Jake Lang kissing the Western Wall in Jerusalem, Israel. The paper in his hand is a bar mitzvah certificate from the Western Wall Heritage Foundation.

Last year, an image of Lang wearing a yarmulke and kissing the Western Wall in Jerusalem emerged on X, which has led to an outcry on the right that Lang is subverting their movement in bad faith.

In an interview with Shirley published on Dec. 18, 2025, Lang confirmed that his mother is an Ashkenazi Jew, but adds that he was raised Irish Catholic. He also adds that while he has “Jewish blood,” he has never practiced Judaism.

While he contends that the picture of him at the Western Wall was simply a “right of passage” for tourists in Israel, he is pictured holding a Bar Mitzvah certificate from the Western Wall Heritage Foundation addressed to him, his name spelled in Hebrew characters.

Additionally, his mother’s Instagram includes another angle of the event, with the caption “Bar Mitzvah/Bat Mitzvah’s at the Wall in Israel.” The photo was taken on May 17, 2016, when Lang was 21 years old.

A picture from Lang’s mother’s Instagram, likely taken around the same time as the still of Lang kissing the Western Wall. Lang’s mother commented on the post: “Bar Mitzvah/Bat Mitzvah’s at the Wall in Israel.”

His mother’s Instagram is also laden with numerous posts celebrating Hanukkah, suggesting she is at least a partially observant Jew.

In a counterprotest to Lang in Plano, Texas, protesters unfurled a banner with an enlarged version of the photo with the text “There are no Muslims on the Epstein list.”

“Stop pretending to be Christian, Jake,” one of the protesters called out to him. Lang, clearly flustered, continued walking past the protesters.

The controversy was further kicked up when Lang announced he was suing several right-wing podcasters who discussed the idea that Lang was Jewish and simply pretending to be Christian to attract bad attention.

“I have NEVER worked with or aided law enforcement, the Israeli Government, Mossad, FBI or any other official agency or private NGO for any of my events, protests, or on J6,” Lang wrote in a post on X.

On Lang’s arrest in January 2021, his father Ned Lang told a local New York newspaper that Lang had substance abuse issues and had been in and out of trouble with law enforcement for more than a decade prior to being charged with 11 felonies for his actions in the deadly riot in D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021.

A still from footage of January 6, 2021, showing Jake Lang in a gas mask swinging a baseball bat at Capitol police. The offense pictured would ultimately result in Lang being charged as a violent offender.

In the immediate aftermath of J6, Lang used his newfound fame to start a militia, using a Telegram channel that grew from 12 to 200 members in the span of a week, according to ProPublica. The plan was ultimately put to bed on Jan. 16, 2021, when Lang was arrested in his New York home.

That was not the end of his vision for a militia.

In June 2024, Lang tried creating a national militia while in prison, which he later dubbed the America First Constitutional Militia. While the group went nowhere, its infrastructure was repurposed for multiple other organizations dedicated to fund raising for J6 defendants, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Other J6 defendants have not been trustful of Lang. Tim Hale, a defendant who was not charged with violent crimes, claimed in an X post shortly after the Dearborn event that Lang never voted for Trump and that he “pretends to be a white Christian to incite racial and religious conflict with blacks and Muslims.”

“He’s a rat and a fraud,” Hale wrote. “He is not MAGA, not America First, and he will land you on a watchlist.”

The next stop on Lang’s campaign of terror across the United States is in Minneapolis, which has been a target of the federal government since Shirley posted his video alleging fraud in Somali-run day care centers in the city. The video proved none of its allegations, instead showing Shirley driving around the city harassing its Somali residents.

Lang’s rally will begin in downtown Minneapolis at city hall, starting with a rally followed by a march to the Cedar Riverside neighborhood, home to a large population of Somalis.

A wide range of community defenders are expected to show up to block Lang’s hate march from reaching Cedar Riverside.

Cover image contributed by L. Cam Anderson.

Far-Right Provocateur Jake Lang Chased Out of Minneapolis During Hate Rally [Jan. 18]