It was the giant chicken alongside the road that started it.

A handful of people attending the weekly Tuesday protest outside Rep. Darrell Issa’s Vista office found tickets on their cars for infractions — including five with no front license plate.

There were a total of seven tickets issued, six for parking and one moving violation.

One woman found herself pulled over and cited for honking her horn in support as she drove past the crowd of roughly 300 protesters. And the sole President Trump supporter at the event also got a ticket, a $56 citation for parking his motorcycle the wrong way, with the nose pointed to the curb instead of to the street.


The citations ruffled feathers, and a few protesters said the sight of the deputy double parked while writing a ticket was far more distracting for drivers than the giant chicken.

“They were creating an incredible traffic problem themselves,” said Ellen Montanari, who has emerged as the rally organizer. She said such aggressive ticketing “has never happened before, ever” during the event.

Authorities said the citations were not intended to be harassment, nor did politics come into play.

A deptuty speaks with a driver he pulled over Tuesday during the weekly rally outside Rep. Darrell Issa’s office. ((Nelvin C. Cepeda/San Diego Union-Tribune) )


The problem Tuesday seems to have started with a 20-foot-tall inflatable chicken with orange-gold hair, a new addition to the attention-seeking protests held just about every week since the inauguration. The chicken was on the dirt, not in the road.

The sheriff’s lieutenant who monitors the rallies said he was concerned the big bird was a safety problem and a traffic hazard, including a distraction for drivers passing by, so he took action to address the matter.

“It wasn’t targeting anybody in particular,” Lt. Mike Munsey said. “It’s a traffic and parking citation. It doesn’t have anything to do with a political issue.”

First, he said, he contacted city code enforcement officers, and sent them a picture to ask if the inflatable fowl violated any city codes. He said he was told it did not.


Vista spokeswoman Andrea McCullough said the City Attorney determined the chicken was linked to the protest, and thus protected by free speech rights — unless it had obstructed traffic.

Munsey said he then called for a traffic enforcement deputy. At some point, the deputy ran out of tickets, and had to have more brought out to him.

Capt. Chuck Cinnamo, who runs the Sheriff’s station in Vista, said the deputy was called to the area to look for traffic violators. Once out there, authorities spotted and cited other parking violations.

“(They were) out there to make sure that some of the safety concerns were addressed, but it doesn’t mean we are not going to enforce the law when we are out there,” Cinnamo said.


He said that his department has fielded complaints about all the cars parked on the street, including from people who live in a gated community near Issa’s office.

“I could see if you said it was harassment if we were out there repeatedly doing petty enforcement,” he said. “This is in response to safety concerns raised and brought to us.”

Since the rallies started, it has been commonplace for passing motorists to hit the horn and wave support as they drive by the gathering. There is usually at least one deputy at the event, sometimes more.

According to sheriff’s officials, there has been one other person cited (in June) for honking their horn in the hour before, during or after the weekly rallies since the start of the year. One driver was ticketed in February for illegally stopping, and two others were cited in March for parking in a red zone.


Since Dec. 20, 2016, the sheriff’s department has received 18 calls for service — including traffic hazards and illegal parking — on the block in question on Tuesday mornings.

The rallies, which routinely draw 200 to 300 people, including many retirees, have themselves drawn controversy, because of noise, high turnout and safety concerns. The protesters have since instituted rules, from running a yellow rope to keep people on the sidewalk and out of the street, to establishing crossing guards of sorts.

Oceanside resident Susan Porter was the motorist ticketed Tuesday for honking her horn. She had been in the crowd, but went to move her car, fearing that she may have parked too close to a fire hydrant (although the curb is not painted red in front of it).

The 63-year-old said she gave two beeps, three times — “and my horn is the wimpiest in the world” — as she drove by the crowd to find a new spot. That, she said, is when a deputy pulled a U-turn and pulled her over.


“If nobody had ever blown their horn in front of the rally before, I wouldn’t have blown my horn,” Porter said.

Porter said she plans to fight the ticket, and called the citations “harassment and intimidation.”

“It’s not so much the ticket that’s the bummer for me,” Porter said. “The bummer for me is that I have a lot of respect for police — they have a tough job — and this has just diminished that (good feeling).”

Issa was not even in the country. A senior member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Issa has been in the Middle East as a part of a congressional delegation mission.


teri.figueroa@sduniontribune.com


(760) 529-4945

Twitter: @TeriFigueroaUT