Though she’s no Hollywood celebrity, California congresswoman Maxine Waters was greeted with raucous applause after taking the stage to present at the MTV Movie Awards Sunday night.
Waters, a Democrat who represents parts of Los Angeles, has earned viral acclaim for her frequent denunciations of President Trump in recent months. Known as Auntie Maxine on social media, outlets from CNN to Elle have highlighted her growing appeal with progressive millennials.
The crowd at MTV’s Movie Awards gave Waters a standing ovation during Sunday’s broadcast. Actress Tracee Ellis Ross, who co-presented the Fight the System award with Waters, went off script to thank the congresswoman for being “an extraordinary example for all of us, especially in these times.”
In these times, actually, Waters has suggested President Trump should be impeached on at least two dozen occasions. At one point, she claimed to have never directly called for his impeachment, despite leading an “impeach 45” chant at a rally in mid-April. Referring to the infamous “Buzzfeed Dossier,” Waters said in March, “We already know that the part about the coverage that they have on him, with sex actions, is supposed to be true. They have said that that’s absolutely true.” Waters later walked that statement back, but even Buzzfeed declared her comments were false.
“I don’t honor this president. I don’t respect this president. And I’m not joyful in the presence of this president,” Waters remarked in February, explaining her decision not to attend Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress.
Water’ career is also tainted by an ethics investigation. The Washington Examiner‘s Phil Wegmann recently summarized the controversy as such:
During the height of the 2008 fiscal crisis, Waters helped arrange a meeting between the Treasury Department and top executives of a bank where her husband was a shareholder. Using her post on the House Financial Committee as leverage, she called Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson personally, asking him to meet with minority-owned banks.
When Treasury followed through, there was only one financial institution present: OneUnited. Had that bank gone under, the New York Times reported, Waters’ husband would’ve lost as much as $350,000. Luckily for the Waters family, OneUnited received a cool $12 million in bailout funds.
Though the ethics committee eventually cleared Waters, Wegmann noted: “At best, [the ruling] shows that Waters runs a haphazard office. At worst, it suggests she deliberately took steps to avoid prosecution.”
The editorial board of the New York Post published an editorial in April arguing, “Rep. Maxine Waters … is the current darling of the left — which tells you just how crazy Democrats have gotten.”
“Waters, in short, can’t be bothered to make sense,” the Post wrote, “and that’s why they love her.”
The same people who applaud Waters for bashing Trump simultaneously bash his administration’s perceived incoherence, ethical questions, and coarse rhetoric — those are all qualities that can also be attributed to Waters.
As an arbiter of youth culture, MTV would better serve its audience by featuring more suitable role models than Maxine Waters.
Emily Jashinsky is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
