Republicans Call For Censure Of Congresswoman Maxine Waters Following Protest Comments

As the deliberations continued in Derek Chauvin’s trial, the former Minneapolis police officer who pinned George Floyd under his knee for nine minutes and 29 seconds, a controversy surrounding Congresswoman Maxine Waters gathered momentum. 

Over the weekend Waters joined a protest in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota where a police officer recently shot and killed a young black man, Daunte Wright. She urged them to become “more confrontational” and “more active.” 

Chauvin’s defense attorneys asked for a mistrial based on Waters’ remarks. 

“I’ll give you that Congresswoman Waters may have given you something on appeal that may result in this whole trial being overturned,” Judge Peter Cahill told defense attorney Eric Nelson on Monday.

House Minority Leader Congressman Kevin McCarthy called for Democrats to censure Waters.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi defended Waters’ remarks, explaining that Waters had “talked about confrontation in the manner of the Civil Rights movement.” 

And Waters accused the Republican Party of seizing on her comments as an opportunity to inflame their conservative base.

She told The Grio, “Republicans will jump on any word, any line and try to make it fit their message and their cause for denouncing us and denying us, basically calling us violent … any time they see an opportunity to seize on a word, so they do it and they send a message to all of the white supremacists, the KKK, the Oath Keepers, the [Proud] Boys and all of that, how this is a time for [Republicans] to raise money on [Democrats] backs.”

With Black America — as well as the rest of the country — following the trial developments closely, Waters’ remarks drew criticism for inflaming an already volatile situation, but there was also support.

Congresswoman Stacey Plaskett said, “I’m not moved by what Maxine Waters says and neither should all of us. Kevin McCarthy should be concerned with what’s happening in his own caucus … When he had individuals in his own caucus — you know Taylor Greene, Gosar and Matt Gaetz doing the most abominable things, saying outrageous, not just dog whistles, but outright racist comments he hasn’t made any move to remove them to censure them or to even reprimand them. So, how dare he at this point have a discussion about Maxine Waters, he needs to look at his own caucus and clean up his own house.”