Nebraska congressman Jeff Fortenberry’s office allegedly threatened a professor for liking a Facebook picture that showed a campaign sign vandalized to say “Jeff Fartenberry,” according to a report.

Political science professor Ari Kohen said he just thought it was funny when he came across the image showing a Fortenberry campaign sign pasted over with googly eyes and the “O” in the candidate’s name changed to an “A,” the Lincoln Journal Star reported.

“I know this is not high comedy,” he told local papers. “It was Sunday, I was bored and got a laugh out of it. I clicked ‘like’ because I found it amusing.”

But then, Kohen, who teaches at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, got a call from the Republican congressman’s chief of staff William “Reyn” Archer III. When the Kohen called Archer back late last week, the chief of staff reportedly accused him of supporting political vandalism.

“He told me he could put this out publicly, that I liked vandalism, and essentially that that would be bad for me,” Kohen said.

“It wasn’t clear at all what he wanted from me, if he wanted me to unlike or retract it.”

Archer also emailed the chair of the university’s political science department to claim that Kohen supported political vandalism, according to email the paper obtained.

On Monday, Kohen filed a complaint against Archer with the House Ethics Committee and provided a recording of his conversation with Archer.

“To have people in this position who are ready and willing to abuse their authority like this, to bully people and push people around and threaten to call down retribution over something that maybe hurt somebody’s feelings,” he said, “we’re all poorer if that’s what’s happening in this country.”

Archer denies threatening Kohen, saying the two had an “amicable” conversation.

“He saw it as humorous; we saw it as a slippery slope to liking vandalism,” he told the paper.