Democrat Congresswoman Encourages Harassment of Public Servants

Over the weekend, Democratic Congresswoman Maxine Waters rallied a crowd of protestors in Los Angeles, telling them:

Let’s make sure we show up wherever we have to show up. And if you see anybody from [President Trump’s] 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.

Waters’ rhetoric seemed to applaud the discrimination shown to White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders Friday night when she was told to leave a restaurant:

Last night I was told by the owner of Red Hen in Lexington, VA to leave because I work for @POTUS and I politely left. Her actions say far more about her than about me. I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so

— Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) June 23, 2018

This comes after several similar recent incidents aimed at members of President Trump’s Cabinet, including protestors shouting “Shame!” at DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen while she was a patron of a Mexican restaurant.

Waters’ hate-fueled comments encourage the public harassment of civil servants such as Nielsen and Sanders. Such actions are cruel, divisive, and counterproductive toward the end of goals of unity, compromise, and service to the American public.

Fellow members of Congress should disavow Waters’ hateful rhetoric, and instead support a peaceful democratic process that involves respectful discussion, including among those who disagree.

Though you wouldn’t know it based on Congresswoman Waters’ comments, civility is not dead.