UFC Hall of Famer Tito Ortiz was recently elected to the Huntington Beach, Calif. City Council, where he was also named the city’s Mayor Pro Tem.
Ortiz has always been a lightning rod for criticism, whether it be inside or outside of the cage. That has continued and even amplified since he was elected to city office.
A longtime supporter of U.S. President Donald Trump, Ortiz has also been quite vocal about the coronavirus pandemic and expresses criticism of the effectiveness of efforts to counter it with policies like requiring people to wear masks.
During Ortiz’s first city council meeting, he fielded a heavy dose of criticism from a Huntington Beach resident, who attended via phone.
He was recently engaged in further critical conversations over mask wearing with another council member during a recent meeting, all of which are video recorded. Ortiz was not wearing a mask at the meeting.
Tito Ortiz city council mask confrontation
A few days later, Ortiz made the local news in California after he got into a heated confrontation with a resident at a local food distribution event.
Ortiz was handing out food when the resident confronted him about his beliefs on immigration enforcement. The situation escalated with the resident making comments about Ortiz “getting hit too many times in the head” and Chuck Liddell knocking him out. Ortiz yelled at the man to back off and police were eventually called, but the situation didn’t appear to get physical.
The local news story on CBSLA 2 opened with the confrontation, but focused solely on Ortiz’s refusal to wear a mask.
Tito Ortiz confrontation with resident and TV news coverage
Tito Ortiz’s response to uproar
Tito Ortiz in anti-mask confrontation with citizen and at city council meeting
