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All Democrat Leaders In Congress Refuse To Denounce Rep. Maxine Waters’ Calls For Harassing Public Officials

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House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi is the only member of Democratic leadership from the House or the Senate who has proven willing to push back on Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) for encouraging a crowd to harass members of President Trump’s cabinet.

Waters said at an immigration rally on Sunday, “If you see anybody from that cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd, and you push back on them, and you tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere.”

Pelosi tweeted a tepid response that could be interpreted to describe Waters’ comments as “predictable but unacceptable.” The tweet seemed to place more blame on Trump for Waters’ actions than on Waters herself. While she quoted another tweet about Waters, Pelosi did not specifically reference Waters or her comments.

 

The Federalist reached out to all of the Democratic leadership of both the House and the Senate this morning. Every office stated that their Congress member had not released a statement on Waters’ call to harassment, and declined to object to her comments in any way. That included Pelosi’s office, which directed The Federalist to a comment line. Pelosi’s tweet obliquely referencing Waters was published two hours later.

Waters’ call for continued aggression came after White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders and Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen were the targets of targeted harassment from activists who openly aligned themselves with the political left.

The Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Virginia refused Sanders service after consulting with some of their staff, who objected to the Trump administration reverting to a policy about transgender soldiers that President Obama had maintained throughout nearly his entire tenure. Protesters forced Nielsen out of a Mexican restaurant in Washington DC, calling detention policies for illegal immigrants that also were the norm under Obama “concentration camps.”

The mainstream media is also not calling for Democrats to condemn Waters’ incendiary rhetoric. This contrasts sharply with their swift backlash to the border enforcement that led to more family separations, after which many pundits called for Republicans to denounce the practice. Many did so, including Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and Sen. Lindsey Graham.

In addition to contacting Democratic leadership, The Federalist also reached out to some members of the Progressive Caucus, to which Waters belongs. Out of more than 30 members, only one — Rep. Raúl Grijalva — condemned “violence for any kind of political reasons.”