Embattled Maxine Waters Challenges Tea Party to a Fight

Rep. Maxine Waters is up to her old Tea Party-hating tricks again.

At a speech to fellow Democrats in Denver, the California congresswoman said Republicans are waging a war against women and relentlessly attacking President Barack Obama, the Denver Post reported. “We cannot allow the opportunities that America stands for to be eroded by those who simply want to bring this president down,” she said, according to the Post. “After a good night sleep, I wake up the next day, and I say, ‘Come on, Tea Party, let’s get it on.’”

Waters is the target of a House Ethics Committee inquiry into allegations that she attempted to facilitate federal bailout financing and do special favors for a bank when her husband had stock in the company worth about $200,000.

This isn’t the first time Waters has tried to provoke the Tea Party. Last month she accused the party of harboring a “mean spirit” in a video posted on Youtube. “I don’t know what party they’ve been to — that must have been some bitter tea,” she said. “They came with a mean spirit, and now they want to cut the food stamps. They don’t want to fund education. They want to give all of the tax breaks to the richest people.”

And last year she roused the ire of conservative activists in August when she told a gathering in Inglewood, Calif. that the tea party “can go straight to hell.”