Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson’s press conference in Baltimore on Wednesday didn’t get off to the best of starts.

A Morning Star Baptist Church of Christ member asked Carson’s staffers and the media to leave its vacant lot because they had not sought prior permission to use it for the Trump Cabinet secretary’s press briefing, reported The Atlantic.

Carson ended up delivering his speech, in which he defended President Donald Trump’s racist attacks on Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) and the city, nearby.

Church member Gregory Evans told The Baltimore Sun it was “nothing personal” that he asked the trespassers to leave and said he hadn’t known “it was Secretary Carson.”

“I just know there were a bunch of people over there that were taking over our site,” Evans told the newspaper. “And we said, ‘Why are they here?’ They’ve not even asked for permission to be here.”