A First Amendment case is forming in Illinois. A guy was arrested and charged with a felony hate crime for throwing up a Nazi salute and shouting "white power" while sitting in the front seat of his car. A woman saw this and reported him to police. According to the police report, the man did not threaten the woman, and there was not repeated harassment. He did not physically touch her or get in her face. No direct insults. And yet the guy is sitting in jail charged with a felony. How? The police charged him with disorderly conduct and then used that as a pretense to say he was engaged in a hate crime because of the salute. Didn't even matter that he was sitting in his own car. This is a massive violation of the First Amendment. SCOTUS ruled in numerous cases (Minnesota 1992, which tried to criminalize "bigoted speech", Snyder vs. Phelps, and the Skokie case) that salutes, slogans, signs, flags, etc. were ALL protected speech regardless of setting and circumstance. Since the suspect was not directly confronting the women or hurling insults, there is no "fighting words" exemption invoked here. If this is allowed to stand, any of us could get thrown in jail simply for wearing a MAGA hat or arguing with a leftist in the street. Someone could get thrown in prison for shouting "Free Palestine" outside a Jewish deli. https://wgntv.com/news/police-new-lenox-man-arrested-after-yelling-white-power-making-nazi-salute-at-family/