Ms. Magazine, Winter 2004

On this crisp October afternoon, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) is putting the finishing touches on a press release criticizing the Bush administration’s lack of action in stopping the genocide in Darfur, Sudan. It is tentatively entitled: “Damn It Mr. Bush, Do Something,” and her staff has asked if she’s sure she’d like to risk ruffling feathers and leave it that way. Her answer, in trademark Waters fashion, is a definitive, “Yes.”

Waters, 66, has been brazenly battling injustices for most of her life. A representative of the thirty-fifth district in California since 1990, she began her political career in the state assembly as a champion of Head Start, a program which provides services for the country’s low-income, pre-school children, and in her 25 years of public service has consistently fought for those without a voice. She influenced the largest divestment of state pension funds from businesses involved in apartheid South Africa, introduced the country’s first statewide Child Abuse Prevention Program and expanded US debt relief for Africa and other developing nations.

Waters is known as much for her feistiness as she is for her accomplishments. Her bluntness has drawn criticism, though she says: “I have a pretty thick skin. I’ve moved to the point where the fact that people dislike me doesn’t destroy me,” but it is this quality that has positioned her as one of the highest ranking American-American women in politics, and that gets her results.

Former Mayor of Los Angeles Richard Riordan once said of her: “She’s a pit bull. She doesn’t beat around the bush and that’s a style, I think, that’s effective.”

“I am a little bit confrontational and am described as someone who will speak her mind—that’s true,” agrees Waters simply. “But I try to pick my battles. I try to asses the approach that will best work.”

One of the Congresswoman’s major crusades this year has been to help restore order in Haiti by returning the country’s first democratically elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, to office. Aristide, a former priest and champion of the poor, was overthrown in a coup in February, 2004 and allegedly forced to flee to the Central African Republic by US Special Forces—a charge that the Bush Administration has denied. The country has been wracked by violence, and since September, when parts of the island were destroyed by Tropical Storm Jeanne, there has been widespread looting and killing.

Waters has been friends with Aristide since 1994, when she again fought to get the newly elected president, then ousted by the same forces that planned the coup this year, returned to power. She also lobbied the Clinton administration, and was even arrested while protesting outside the White House, to change its treatment of Haitian refugees.

In March, Waters was part of the delegation that accompanied Aristide from the Central African Republic to Jamaica. She maintains that he was removed by the Bush Administration in part to maintain a cheap source of labor for American businesses and to protect the Haitian elite from paying taxes:

“This is about control, about keeping the Haitian working class down,” she says. “Aristide had the audacity to tell poor people that they should have a hand in shaping their democracy.”

Waters’ continuous fight for the underdog has perhaps been inspired by her own life. She and her 12 siblings were raised by a single mother in St. Louis, Missouri. The family was often on welfare, and Waters started working in factories and segregated restaurants when she was 13. Despite the disadvantages, Waters prevailed: “My mother was a very strong woman and she instilled confidence in us,” she says. Three teachers, who not only educated but fostered her development outside of school, were also influential: “When you’re poor and have lots of siblings, no one sees you as a thinking individual with talents. [Ms. Carter, Ms. Stokes and Ms. Johnson] saw me; they looked at me and they saw a person.”

Waters’ job as she sees it is to open the doors of opportunity for those born into similar circumstances, both abroad and at home. She is particularly concerned with the plight of women and children, who are most affected by indigence.

“What bothers me most is poverty,” she says. “Poverty is all consuming—so much potential is unrealized, dreams are dashed. Until we find a way to help people earn, to overcome obstacles to getting a job and an education, this country will never be what it can be.”