WATCH: Small business owner in New York rips up $15K coronavirus fine on live TV

https://youtu.be/xAwbH3__KzU

A New York business owner and retired Marine ripped up a $15,000 fine he received from the health department after hosting a small protest with business owners amid coronavirus closures.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz “don’t have the guts to answer why they get to draw a $225,000 salary, for Gov. Cuomo, and for Poloncarz is $103,000 salary, but the working man and woman doesn’t get to earn. They get to take our money, but we don’t get to earn. They don’t have the guts to tell us that,” Athletes Unleashed Gym owner Robby Dinero said right before he ripped up the fine during a segment with Fox News’s Sandra Smith on Tuesday.

“I posted on Facebook Friday night that I wanted to get together, business owners, and protest and fight the lockdown that I feel is infringing upon our freedom. They showed up Friday night. We were about 20 minutes into that meeting when some sheriffs and the department of health official showed up, uninvited. My business was closed, we were not conducting business. This was a protest,” Dinero said during the interview before ripping up the fine.

A video of the gathering went viral Saturday, showing a health inspector and three police officers being turned away by the crowd of small business owners near Buffalo.

“We will not comply!” the business owners and their supporters can be heard chanting in the video.

"I'm asking for you guys to have some compassion," one man says to the health inspector, "for the people that have lost everything."

“A couple of the patriots that were here with me said, ‘Hey, Robby, there are some sheriffs here, department of health officials. What you want us to do?’ And I said, ‘Get them to leave.' And, well, the video speaks for itself,” Dinero recounted during his interview on Fox News.

“Those patriots took it upon themselves to stand shoulder to shoulder and told them to get out. And we were right b... (Read more)

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