If the Republican-led state senators of Kentucky have any say in it, you could end up in jail for 90 days for insulting a police officer in the city, the Washington Post reports.
The bill would allow police to charge you if you taunt or insult a police officer “that would have a direct tendency to provoke a violent response from the perspective of a reasonable and prudent person.”
In the state of Kentucky, it’s already illegal to promote violence, as well as to specifically promote violence against a police officer. However, the bill passed by the Kentucky senate Thursday would also allow police to determine what speech, directed at police, would constitute a crime because it apparently make police mad.
Republican State Senator Danny Carroll said the bill was meant to prevent speech “obviously designed to elicit a response from the officer — something to push them to making a mistake, pushing them to violence.”
The passage of the bill comes two days before the anniversary of the homicide of Breonna Taylor at the hands of police officers, a shooting that sparked protests in Louisville and around the nation.