Might be time to call the ACLU. A Texas sheriff is threatening to have disorderly conduct charges filed against a truck owner with a sticker expressing outrage against Donald Trump, on the grounds that the language used was too salty for public use.
On Wednesday, Fort Bend County sheriff Troy Nehls posted on Facebook that he was seeking information about the owner of a white GMC Sierra with a sticker in its rear window proclaiming, “Fuck Trump and fuck you for voting for him.” In the post, Nehls said he had received a number of complaints about the “offensive display,” and stated that the local D.A. said she would accept the filing of disorderly conduct charges against the owner. However, he added, “I feel like we could come to an agreement regarding a modification to it.”
Sheriff Nehls apparently removed the post from public view on Thursday morning, but not before the image went viral, spreading far and wide across the internet and local news casts alike. As of Thursday just before noon Eastern Standard Time, the image had been shared on Facebook more than 10,000 times, and had more than 19,000 comments.
In case you’re thinking that this is just another case of a cop in a one-horse town with nothing better to do than troll the local liberal, keep in mind that Houston-adjacent Fort Bend is the 10th-largest county in Texas, with an estimated population of roughly 741,000, according to the 2010 census. It’s also the wealthiest county in the state, with a median family income nearly twice as high as the Texas average.
Not surprisingly, many social media users reacted with what can be generously described as “irritation” at Sheriff Nehls’s seemingly-political calculation, both in the comments of his post…
…and elsewhere.
