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I think leftists actually believe that the ability to engage in annoying protest, particularly including blocking streets, is a form of free speech. It is a rare case where the tactic is tribally-coded, not just the target.
Right-wing protesters whose message the left considers within the bounds of free speech (like pro-foxhunting protestors in the UK, or pro-motorist protestors almost everywhere) get the same kid glove treatment from the leftist establishment viz-a-viz enforcement of public order laws that leftist protestors get. Anti-immigrant, anti-COVID-restrictions, and explicitly racist protests get the jackboot, but then those messages got the banhammer when expressed peacefully on social media.
The only groups in Europe that come to mind that are remotely comparable to what the anti-ICE people are doing, are the climate activists that glue themselves to highways. Most of everyone else files for a protest permit at the town hall.
I'm mostly thinking about the various trucker and farmer protests involving deliberately blocking roads in the UK and France. These are usually nominally about fuel tax, but are clearly right-coded. They get the kid gloves, because tax policy is the type of issue where the left considers occasional roadblocks to be free speech. The Canadian trucker convoy got the jackboot because the left doesn't consider COVID-19 to be an issue where free speech applies.
The largest right-populist-coded protest movement in Europe in recent years is the gilets jaunes in France, which didn't touch the hot buttons around race and immigration and got the kid gloves.
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Unless it's their political enemies doing it.
Sure, they don't think that their enemies have any free speech rights whatsoever. Their words are "violence" or "harassment." Or they are "nazis" who deserved to be "punched."
In other words, it's who/whom.
Here's a hypothetical: Suppose a bunch of NYC car drivers decided to have an organized "block the bike lane" protest throughout Manhattan. Do you really think that the Left would defend this as valid free speech?
When right-wing protestors blocked streets to protest fuel taxes, speed limit enforcement etc. in various European countries, they got the same kid-glove treatment that left-wing protestors do.
The NYPD are notoriously reluctant to enforce laws protecting cyclists from drivers, including laws against parking in bike lanes - I can't comment on how a hypothetical protest situation would change that.
I am not familiar enough with European politics to comment on this.
I'm very confident that the Left would NOT see it as free speech.
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I enjoyed the various tweets about how cyclists will be thrilled to find out what you're allowed to do to a driver that bumps into you with their car.
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