“Do as I say, not as I do.”
That should be the motto of California Democrat Maxine Waters and her team after the Federal Election Commission (FEC)just said the longtime lawmaker’s 2020 campaign committee, Citizens for Waters, violated several campaign finance laws.
Despite the illegal moves, Waters’ congressional campaign has been fined a just $68,000 for violating several federal campaign finance laws during her 2020 reelection bid.
According to documents from the FEC recently published by independent watchdog OpenSecrets, investigation documents showed Waters’ 2020 campaign committee, Citizens for Waters, understated contributions and spending by hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The reelection campaign of Rep. Maxine Waters will pay a $68,000 fine after an investigation determined that it violated election rules regarding fundraising. Read more: https://t.co/F8ajbu54lp pic.twitter.com/FbawH9LOUM
— NEWSMAX (@NEWSMAX) June 2, 2025
The Waters campaign has agreed to pay the massive fine and “send its treasurer to a commission sponsored training program for political committees.”
“Respondent shall submit evidence of the required registration and attendance at such event to the Commission,” the document said.
The documents from the investigation also stated that Citizens for Waters had illegally accepted excessive campaign contributions from seven people totaling $19,000 in 2019 and 2020, despite the maximum legal individual contribution being capped at $2,800.
The committee offloaded those excessive donations, but in an “untimely” fashion, the document said.
Waters’ campaign committee also “made four prohibited cash disbursements that were each in excess of $100, totaling $7,000,” the FEC report continued.
The campaign committee “contends that it retained legal counsel to provide advice and guidance to the treasurer and implemented procedures to ensure the disbursements comply with the requirements of the Act.”
Leilani Beaver, who was listed as Citizens for Waters’ attorney, sent the FEC a letter last year that maintained the campaign finance violations were “errors” that “were not willful or purposeful.”
Waters, the top Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, has served in Congress since 1991.
However, this is not the first time she and her campaign have engaged in, and been accused of, campaign violations.
In 2004, Waters arranged for her daughter to work on her campaign as a slate mailer — an uncommon practice on the federal level — providing her daughter with over $1.2 million in payments since, which many critics allege to be obvious campaign finance malpractice.
The House Ethics Committee also formally accused Waters of violating conflict of interest rules in 2010, claiming she was giving government help to a bank with ties to her husband.
The Committee eventually dismissed the case but Waters’ chief of staff was reprimanded.
Citizens for Waters was accused by the National Legal and Policy Center of accepting an illegal campaign contribution during her 2018 reelection campaign, but the FEC dismissed the complaint in a 5-1 vote in 2021.
The longtime California lawmaker, named the “Most Corrupt” politician in Washington, D.C. in 2011, has become well-known for her staunch opposition to President Donald Trump, even accusing him of being a criminal.
During Trump’s first term in 2018, she notably made headlines when she told her supporters to “create a crowd” around administration officials, suggesting that they were “not welcome” in a variety of public places including restaurants, stores and gas stations.
And she even claimed that the 2024 presidential election was rigged.