Apparently the police who pulled over Daunte Wright said he had a dangling air freshener on his rear view mirror, which is an offence of some type.
Why is that an offence in Minnesota?
It is a violation on many places. Obstructs a driver’s visual field.
Which is only enforced when it is useful to the police or the individual officer to do so, not in all cases. And by “useful” I mean when it serves whatever purpose they have that requires them to pull over or otherwise harass a harmless driver.
Yep. It’s selectively enforced, so many people don’t realize it’s illegal. It’s the first pretense I was stopped for when I moved to Chicago, as a young black guy driving through a North Shore suburb. It was literally 20 years before I heard a white person complain about being stopped for it.
You won’t get any push-back from me. Just offering what I was taught about it.
I do think a few people carry interior decor past common sense and block too much, but not a single air freshener blotter. As with most things, a few carry it too far.
Mine was my hs graduation tassel. I knew better than to say anything, but when the officer told me why I was pulled over, I know my expression said “You’re kidding, right?” In fairness, it was just a pretext to find out what I was doing in Winnetka at 2 a.m. - I was let go with a warning, though - hilariously - he did show up at Dominos the next day to see that I really worked there.
Must have been a reeeeal slow couple of days in Winnetka.
Probably your tassel was in the school colors of his arch rival school.
Exactly as described - air freshener, obscured license, failing to signal lane change properly, burned out taillight, burned out license plate light, tow ball obscures plate, tint looks too dark, crack in windshield, back window blocked - all excuses to stop a car when the police are so inclined to do so. Then they can look inside and find a deeper reason to intrude on the driver. At that point “smell alcohol”, “driver seems evasive/shifty”, “driver looks under the influence” (all subjective judgement by police officer) give then further excuses to intrude.
A few years ago, some jurisdictions used the fact they saw home-made CD’s on the passenger seat as an excuse to claim the driver was engaged in illegally trafficking in counterfeit materials that violated copyright. Since that was in plain sight, it gave them an excuse to search the car.
I have no doubt DWB was the actual reason for many stops but the police stop people of all colors in assorted amounts… I (SWM) was stopped once by a police officer for not having a front license plate - when he knew the province next door, as he could see from my rear plate, did not have front licenses. It was just an excuse to pull me over and give me and the vehicle the once over.
Where I live it’s often ski goggles. And recently, masks. It’s really a stupid thing to do, as it does block some of your vision.
I didn’t get stopped for it, but to go along with speeding1, I was warned for it. That was as a white kid in a really beat up older car in a rich town. Age was 17. Mine was also the graduation tassel. I suspect he was looking for drug paraphernalia but who knows.
1 3 miles over the limit where the limit dropped from 40 to 35 going around a curve.
Thank God for our boys in blue, keeping us safe from pizza delivery kids 
Huh. I have my Phone holder stuck on my windshield. Wonder if I’m gonna get dinged for that someday. IMO its better to have your GPS in line of sight with the road than to look down at it.
Presumably this is the relevant Minnesota provision (Sec. 169.71) (bolding added):
Subdivision 1.Prohibitions generally; exceptions.
(a) A person shall not drive or operate any motor vehicle with:
(1) a windshield cracked or discolored to an extent to limit or obstruct proper vision;
(2) any objects suspended between the driver and the windshield, other than:
(i) sun visors;
(ii) rearview mirrors;
(iii) driver feedback and safety monitoring equipment when mounted immediately behind, slightly above, or slightly below the rearview mirror;
(iv) global positioning systems or navigation systems when mounted or located near the bottommost portion of the windshield;
(v) electronic toll collection devices; and
(vi) an identifying device as provided in section 169.58, subdivision 5, when the device is mounted or located near the bottommost portion of the windshield; or
(3) any sign, poster, or other nontransparent material upon the front windshield, sidewings, or side or rear windows of the vehicle, other than a certificate or other paper required to be so displayed by law or authorized by the state director of the Division of Emergency Management or the commissioner of public safety.
(b) Paragraph (a), clauses (2) and (3), do not apply to law enforcement vehicles.
(c) Paragraph (a), clause (2), does not apply to authorized emergency vehicles.
Yeah! Where will society end up if police can’t kill people who aren’t perfectly compliant during an arrest?
Modnote: Until a GQ Mod shows up, a reminder. This is GQ. No sniping at each other please and this isn’t a debate forum. I’ll reopen in 10 minutes.
I don’t have a cite, but I think I have read about police-stops (with a tragic and/or controversial outcome) where the excuse was a busted tail-light. Now, since drivers stopped by the police in the USA are supposed to stay in their cars, they can’t check up on that until afterwards and will have to trust the police officer on that matter. It makes me wonder, have there been any stories about busted tail-lights that suddenly started working again after a fruitless police-stop?
I question the validity of this statement. Copyright violations are generally civil, not criminal infractions. I also have quite a few home burned music CD’s, all are legal for me to own as long as I am not selling them. If an officer did question the content of a CD I have in my possession, I would ask for a search warrant before I would turn the CD over.
When I was preparing for my driving test in Pennsylvania, my instructor told me to make sure nothing was hanging from the rear view mirror because that would be grounds for failing the test. As was any sort of window sticker other than the state vehicle inspection sticker (like a university sticker in the rear window).
I deleted my original post because I forgot this was general questions. I believe Falchion answered the question.
My state has similar rules.
Moderator Note
The off-topic post was withdrawn, so let’s have no further comment on it in this thread. Just ignore it and move on, please.
Edited to add:
Upon review of the entire thread, the OP, as asked, was a factual question, which has been answered factually, that the air freshener obstructs the window, and that this is selectively enforced. That selective enforcement gets into racial and police/political issues that are outside of the scope of GQ. Feel free to discuss those issues, but generally that’s not a GQ discussion. Feel free to link back to this thread if desired.
While the OP is basically asked and answered, I will leave this open in case there are any other factual issues that someone wishes to add to the discussion.