Muskego Man Fights Charge for Writing ‘Jan. 6’ on Sidewalk With Chalk
A $565 citation for disorderly conduct. 'It’s my right to free speech,' says Jim Brownlow.
Chalk. Photo by Jim Brownlow
On the morning of the four-year anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, Muskego resident Jim Brownlow headed to his local post office — but not to mail a letter or package.
At about 7:30 a.m., Brownlow, then 76 years old, dropped to his hands and knees outside the post office and wrote “Jan. 6” on the sidewalk with sidewalk chalk.
He said all he wanted to do was to remind the public of the now-infamous attempt to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power, a tenet of American Democracy. He said he views the Jan. 6 Capitol attack in a similar light to the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.
Speaking out by writing his message in chalk on a public sidewalk, he felt, was an act of constitutionally-protected free speech.
“I was not there to interfere with anybody’s use of the post office,” Brownlow told WPR. “All they had to do was look at what I wrote and remember, hopefully, or ignore it.”
About a month later, on Feb. 5, 2025, police came to Brownlow’s home and arrested him for criminal damage to property.
“It’s pretty shocking being arrested,” Brownlow said. “I had to empty my pockets. I had to take off my belt. I was not allowed to wear a coat. I was handcuffed behind my back. I was put into the back of a squad car.”
He was ultimately issued a $565 citation for disorderly conduct.
Now, more than a year after he wrote with sidewalk chalk, Brownlow, 77, is still trying to fight the case in Muskego Municipal Court. He’s representing himself and believes his arrest and citation were attempts to punish him for using his free speech rights.
“It’s my right to free speech and to pay a fine or something, it would just be morally wrong,” he said. “I’m not guilty of anything. And it’s not just my speech, I’m afraid it’s everybody else’s if they can do this to me. I’m very sure that I have to do this for our democracy.”
The Muskego Police Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment and City Attorney Jeffrey Warchol was out of the office Friday. Mayor Rick Petfalski said via email the city attorney does not comment on ongoing cases and the mayor’s office does not give input on municipal citation prosecution.
The police report from the incident states other writings were present on the sidewalk, including one that read, “We almost lost our democracy.” Brownlow maintains he only wrote “Jan. 6.”
The report also says a building management company paid a painting company $300 to remove the chalk and paid $600 in administrative costs related to the incident.
“I know that chalk washes off with plain water, so it doesn’t damage anything,” Brownlow said.
At his most recent court appearance this month, Megan Degner, the city’s legal intern, argued Brownlow’s actions went beyond protected speech, according to a report by TMJ4 News in Milwaukee.
“Mr. Brownlow doesn’t have the right to work the Muskego public and postal customers into a frenzy over a politically charged event and then sit back and call it free speech,” Degner said in municipal court.
Howard Schweber, a professor of American politics and political theory at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, teaches a course on the First Amendment. He said the city’s legal intern’s statement in municipal court is “incredibly damning for the city” and evidence that they may be prosecuting Brownlow for using his First Amendment rights.
“Free speech is exactly the right to work members of the public into a frenzy with politically charged statements,” Schweber said. “That is what’s called ‘core speech,’ and that is, in the most basic possible sense, what the First Amendment exists to protect.”
He said free speech rights do not extend to encouraging someone to commit an illegal act, or face-to-face speech that’s meant to trigger violence.
“The quoted statement from the city’s attorney could not be more wrong and could not do more to establish that this really is prosecution brought in violation of First Amendment rights,” Schweber said.
Brownlow said he’s been to court four times so far in this case and he’s hoping it reaches its conclusion in the next month or so.
He says he’s confident that he’ll beat the case because he has “the law on my side,” but he admits that the case “has been in the back of my mind” in the months it’s taken.
“It’s disturbing for democracy that if a person exerts some tiny little bit of free speech, they have to spend months defending themselves,” he said. “That is a little bit troubling to me. But other than that, I’m perfectly capable of defending myself.”
Muskego man fights court case over writing ‘Jan. 6’ on sidewalk with chalk was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
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