A protester holds an American flag while protesting in Oakland, Calif., on Monday, Nov. 24, 2014, after the announcement that a grand jury decided not to indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed 18-year-old.

US President-elect Donald Trump proposed on Tuesday to punish US citizens for burning the US flag by revoking their citizenship or by imprisonment.

The statement followed the series of flag burning incidents in the United States as an expression of protest by the US citizens who oppose Donald Trump’s win in the presidential election. In Los Angeles and Portland the demonstrations resulted in unrest with hundreds of people arrested.

Nobody should be allowed to burn the American flag – if they do, there must be consequences – perhaps loss of citizenship or year in jail!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 29, 2016

“Nobody should be allowed to burn the American flag — if they do, there must be consequences — perhaps loss of citizenship or year in jail,” Trump wrote on Twitter. Burning a US flag is not punished by law in the United States, instead it is identified as “symbolic speech” under the First Amendment of the Constitution.

© Sputnik