“You’ll hurt yourself and the community trying to put this together,” was what Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) said after trying to stop the publication of a news story about Los Angeles’ homeless.
Connor Sheets, an investigative reporter, detailed a March 25 incident in South Los Angeles, where, after being misled by social media rumors, hundreds of homeless people tried to obtain Section 8 housing vouchers.
An event held by nonprofit advocacy group Fathers and Mothers Who Care, which had been meant to help the unhoused obtain emergency shelter, was crashed by the would-be applicants, per report.
Los Angeles Housing Services Authority (LAHSA) workers told the unexpected arrivals that they would only be able to provide their information and enter an emergency housing database, so the confusion reportedly overwhelmed the non-profit.
“I want everybody to go home,” Waters told the crowd at one point, triggering an angry response.
“We don’t got no home, that’s why we’re here! What home we gonna go to?” one member of the crowd yelled back.
“Nothing is going to happen here today,” Waters reportedly responded by laughing.
But shortly after that, Waters appeared to grow frustrated by a question from a local housing advocacy nonprofit, saying: “Excuse me, there’s nobody in Washington who works for their people any f****** harder than I do. I don’t want to hear this. No, no, no.”
One homeless disabled woman, Joyce Burnett, said that Waters instructed the crowd to come back to the South Angeles office the following Tuesday with appropriate documents.
“Maxine Waters was here, and she said to come back Tuesday with our paperwork filled out. “I have it, everything they asked for. But every time we get near the front of the line, they shut the door. They opened the door about 20 minutes ago and said they’re not servicing anyone else today,” said Burnett.
“It’s a bunch of rumors,” said Waters and requested the story not be published.
“You’ll hurt yourself and the community trying to put this together without background. I don’t want you to start trying to write it, you won’t understand it,” Waters added.