The Humboldt Republican Party headquarters in Eureka was vandalized over the weekend, party officials said, with marker-written messages targeting President Donald Trump and other Republican candidates.

“We’re very non-controversial up here. We’re the Republican Party, but we are the local Republican Party,” local party chairman John Schutt told the Times-Standard on Monday. “The thing that gets me is I’m sure some of these people have anger toward President Trump, but none of what they did here, not only will he never know about it, it’s not going to hurt him in any way.

“This is about your friends and neighbors and coworkers and people you live with here. It’s just sad that we can’t exercise our First Amendment rights in peace,” Schutt continued. “There is not one member of my party here that would go down and do this down the street at the Democrat office.”

Schutt said the vandalism occurred sometime between Saturday evening and Sunday morning. He said he discovered it while driving up Fifth Street with his wife.

Former Humboldt Republican Party chairwoman Annette DeModena said they plan to ask the Humboldt County Democrats to join them in condemning the vandalism and calling for civility.

“We don’t want it to happen to anyone,” DeModena said inside the party headquarters on Fifth Street.

Schutt said this is not the first time the office has been vandalized in recent months. He said that a rocks with messages on them had been used to break windows at their headquarters. Neighboring business also had their windows broken, DeModena said.

The messages scrawled on the party headquarters windows included phrases like “Fake President: Impeach + Indite [sic],” “45=lies,” and “Guantanamo and torture X 20 yrs, 45 and all supporters.”

A poster for John Cox for California governor was covered with a large “X” as was a poster that was titled “Voter Fraud From Governor Brown: DMV voter registration.”

Schutt said that volunteers have expressed fear about coming to the headquarters after these incidents. Schutt said he has filed a report with the Eureka Police Department and is set to meet with Chief Steve Watson on Tuesday.

Schutt said that these issues have surfaced under presidents before Trump, but he said that there seems to be a greater divide than ever. He used an example of when he was attending Humboldt State University and invited a Republican speaker to the campus.

“There is no way I can bring that same person up to that campus today,” Schutt said. “The guy would be not allowed to speak, he would have stuff thrown at him. That just shows you the time difference just since the 1990s where politicians can’t come to speak and then you wonder how we’re not being heard by politicians. Because you’re not letting them talk to you.”

Schutt and volunteers at the headquarters on Monday afternoon said that they have civil discussions with people who come into the office.

As for solutions to address political discord at a local level, Schutt said certain parties have taken such extreme measures and used extreme language that he doesn’t know of any solutions other than having law enforcement present at demonstrations to protect public safety.

“Unless we can start having some real community dialogues, and I mean real ones. Not one-sided dialogues,” Schutt said.

Will Houston can be reached at 707-441-0504.