Protester who hugged a Nazi pleads, 'Why do you hate me?'
The man who hugged a Nazi outside Richard Spencer’s speech at the University of Florida on Thursday said, “I could have hit him, I could have hurt him ... but something in me said, ‘You know what? He just needs love.'”
A man wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with swastikas on Thursday was surrounded by a crowd of protesters who screamed, punched and spat on him before Aaron Alex Courtney gave him a hug.
Courtney, a 31-year-old high school football coach in Gainesville, yelled, “Why don’t you like me, dog?” as he wrapped his arms around the Nazi in a video that quickly went viral on social media.
Speaking to the New York Daily News early Friday, Courtney said, “It’s a step in the right direction. One hug can really change the world. It’s really that simple.”
Courtney said he didn’t know who Richard Spencer was when he received a state of emergency notification on his phone on Monday.
Florida Gov. Rick Scott declared the emergency ahead of Spencer’s appearance at the school just two months after the white supremacist helped plan a far-right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that broke out in deadly violence.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/protester-who-hugged-a-nazi-pleads-why-do-you-hate-me/ar-AAtKMJs?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=edgsp
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