No freedom of speech allowed in Louisville.

They’re coming for you next: Matt Schrenger, a police officer in Louisville, Kentucky, was suspended for four months simply because, while off duty and not in uniform, he quietly prayed with his father on the street outside an abortion clinic.

The prayer event took place on February 2021.

That same day, Schrenger was locked out from his work computers, relieved of his police vehicle, and removed from the patrol schedule. Schrenger was suspended and he was stripped of his police powers, pending investigation of his off-duty prayer.

Schrenger was wrongly accused of violating Louisville Metro Police Department Standard Operating Procedures and Kentucky law. By way of a letter dated June 15, 2021, LMPD [Louisville Metro Police Department] Chief Shields admitted that none of the allegations against Officer Schrenger could be sustained. Even after that letter, Schenger’s police powers inexplicably were not restored until June 29, 2021. Even though the facts of the incident were not in dispute, it took the police department more than four months, plus a week, to make its decision after the off-duty prayer incident. [emphasis mine]

The article also notes that on that same day numerous other officers were participating in both a gay rights parade and a Black Lives Matter protest, while on duty and in uniform, and received no punishment though those actions did violate Kentucky law and the department’s procedures.

Fortunately, Schrenger has refused to accept his mistreatment without protest. He has sued.

The lawsuit names Police Chief Erika Shields, the Louisville Metro Police Department, Mayor Greg Fischer, and the City of Louisville, Kentucky. The complaint details their violations of the Free Exercise Clause and Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United State Constitution, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 as Amended, and the Kentucky Civil Rights Act.

What should happen if Schrenger wins is that Shields and the Mayor should be held personally liable, and have to pay out of their own pocket any damages. What will more likely happen will be that the taxpayers will pick up the tab, and these two thugs will walk away unharmed. That’s how justice works today in America: Politicians and their political appointees are given immunity from punishment, allowing them to oppress without fear anyone they do not like or disagree with.

And they are doing it, with increasing glee and abandon. Soon, everyone will be constantly threatened by their tyrannical ambitions.