His position is that the government cannot place restrictions on speech that aren’t “immediately provoking any kind of violence,” but it can step in if it’s believed there will be a large public disturbance to provide protection to the public.

“When you’re talking about right to speech that people really don’t like, they wish it wasn’t here, people are coming in from out of state and they’re saying things that the people who live here disagree with — and in some cases, people are feeling frightened by it — I don’t believe there is a legal remedy to prevent people from doing that,” he said. “But of course, you can place limitations on them that are necessary for public safety, you can ensure that you have a police presence that’s necessary to prevent any violence.”

Hyra, like many others, believes it’s the responsibility of all elected officials to speak out against instances such as these.

“The governor should and other elected officials should speak out and let their opinions be known, let the position of Virginians be known,” he said.