JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Just a day before hateful messages were projected on TIAA Bank Field during the Georgia-Florida game, making national news, the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office responded to calls about another antisemitic incident in Jacksonville.
During the incident, JSO engaged with a man who was identified as Jon Minadeo, the leader of a prominent antisemitic group.
On Friday, viewers sent First Coast News photos of a group of men, who were holding banners with antisemitic language and appeared to be doing a Nazi salute.
The banners said "END JEWISH SUPREMACY IN AMERICA" and HONK IF YOU KNOW IT'S THE JEWS."
A report obtained by First Coast News shows that officers arrived to find that group of eight or nine men waving at drivers from the overpass, wearing bandanas with "NSF" written on the front, with the "S" written in the style of the Nazi symbol. (NSF stands for National Socialist Florida.)
According to the report, several officers engaged with the group, and when they left, Officer Muchowicz, who wrote the report, "thanked the group for their cooperation and apologized for taking up so much time of Mr. Nunes and Mr. Minadeo (referring to Josh Nunes and Minadeo, two of the demonstrators)."
During the exchange, the demonstrators told police they were part of a "peaceful protest" and would leave if police wanted.
Earlier this week, JSO responded to the incident at the Georgia-Florida game Saturday by saying that projecting hateful messages in public is not illegal and is protected by the First Amendment.
A statement from JSO on the issue reads as follows:
"The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office has a legal duty to protect the rights of both those who utilize their Constitutional Right to peacefully gather/protest as well as every other citizen within our County. As such, the officer responded to the scene, conducted his investigation, completed a thorough report and thanked the individual for their time and cooperation. It is not uncommon for officers to thank individuals for being cooperative during an investigation; officers are expected to be respectful of another whether they agree with the individual or not. From the report, it appears the officer did just that; remained professional while performing his duties and responsibilities."
READ MORE: Jacksonville police: Antisemitic displays after Georgia-Florida game protected by First Amendment
Founder of prominent anti-Semitic group was confronted by JSO
According to the report, Minadeo was confronted because he was flying a drone, which was hovering above a roadway in use. This is a Federal Aviation Administration violation.
He did not have his driver's license, but he was able to have someone send him a picture of it to present to police. He was not arrested or cited.
Nunes told police that Minadeo was not with the group and they would prefer him to leave. Minadeo identified himself to police as "the most famous anti-Semite in America on the internet."
He told police that he had been arrested at the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.
The Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle, reported on Sept. 8 that Minadeo had used Gab, a social media platform used by right-wing extremists who have been blocked from other social media, to claim he had been arrested in Poland at Auschwitz-Birkenau.
The Chronicle reported that Minadeo had posted pictures of himself and a fellow Goyim Defense League member, Robert Wilson, holding lewd and derogatory posters outside Auschwitz’s notorious front gate.
Minadeo is known to be the founder of a prominent anti-Semitic group, the Goyim Defense League (a play on the Anti-Defamation League; Goyim being the Hebrew/Yiddish word for non-Jew).
The Anti-Defamation League says that the GDL was responsible for "at least 74 antisemitic propaganda incidents in 2021," and says that it is most prominent in California, Colorado, Florida and New York.
The group promotes the idea that Jews were response for 9/11 -- rhetoric that was plastered on banners in another incident of antisemitism on the anniversary this year.
That incident involved a group on Interstate 95 in Jacksonville, holding banners that said "Jews did 9/11."