Norman slams California Democrat for 'dangerous' comments. She says look at Trump.

U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman announced Tuesday that he's leading the charge to officially condemn California U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters' comments after White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked to leave a Virginia restaurant.

Waters, a Democrat, encouraged people in California to continue publicly confronting Trump administration officials over the zero tolerance border policy that led to the controversial family separation policy.

"Let's make sure we show up wherever we have to show up," she said, according to a video from the Los Angeles event. "And 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. We've got to get the children connected to their parents."

President Donald Trump immediately pushed back via Tweet, calling Waters "an extraordinarily low IQ person," and "unhinged."

Norman, a Rock Hill Republican, and several other representatives introduced a House resolution Tuesday to censure, or officially condemn, Waters for her comments.

Norman said in a statement Tuesday that Waters' comments were "completely, and utterly unacceptable," especially in light of the shooting of Louisiana Republican U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise at a congressional baseball game June 14, 2017.

"The fact that Congressman Steve Scalise was shot – and nearly killed – this time last year for being a Republican, while playing baseball, is exactly why these comments by Rep. Waters are so dangerous," Norman said. "What does this say about our country? This only exacerbates the issue, and deepens our political divide."

Speaking to the House Financial Services Committee Wednesday, Waters pushed back on criticism.

She said Trump is the bigger cause of incivility in politics.

"I think every reasonable person has concluded that the President of the United States of America has advocated violence," she said. "He has been divisive and he has been the one who has caused what we see today, where people are trying to push back on his policies and where people try to have peaceful protests instead of violence, but he continues to call names and he continues to challenge people in very violent ways."

Waters cited examples from Trump's campaign for president, during which he called for violence against protestors at several rallies.

"I’ll quote to you some of his sayings," she said. "In his campaign, I’ll quote, he said: 'I’d like to knock the crap out of them.' Further he said: 'You know what they used to do to guys like that when they were in a place like this? They’d be carried out in a stretcher, folks.' And in addition to that, he also talked about the fact that if someone was hurt , or while they were being assaulted as he was encouraging them to do, he said this: 'So if you see someone getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of them. And would you, seriously?' Trump said, 'OK just knock the hell out. I promise I will pay for the legal fees, I promise, I promise.'

"So Mr. Chairman, if you want to talk about civility, you start with the president of the United States and you implorehim not to continue to promote violence, not to continue to promote divisiveness," Waters said.

What do you think?

This story was originally published June 27, 2018 at 4:30 PM.