ANALYSIS/OPINION:

A Republican lawmaker, Rep. Andy Biggs from Arizona, slapped Rep. Maxine Waters with a measure of censure and a call to resign.

The bigger shock here is that it took that long for someone in the House to take this action.

Waters has been a thorn in the Democrats’ side — albeit a gift that keeps on giving to the Republicans — since the beginning of President Donald Trump’s administration because of her over-the-top rhetoric and Tourette syndrome-like rantings. Some on the left no doubt share her deranged views; others, of less fire and brimstone, have perhaps kept silent on her raging because they regard her media appearances in the vein of a useful idiot taking center stage.

But in recent weeks, she’s grown progressively more bizarre — dangerous, even.

“If you think we’re rallying now,” Waters just said during a rally in Los Angeles, “you ain’t seen nothing yet. If you see anybody from that [Trump] 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.”

And so the left has indeed been doing, most recently booting Sarah Huckabee Sanders, White House press secretary, from a restaurant in Virginia — and then reportedly following along to catcall as members of her family went to a different diner to eat. Want to see more of the effect of what Waters has been calling for, in action?

Ask Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen. She was booed by anti-Trumpers at a Mexican restaurant — taunted by other anti-Trumpers outside her home.

“Increasing threats to Homeland Security include burned animal carcass left on staffer’s porch,” ran one recent ABC Radio headline.

Biggs has had enough, and is pointing fingers Waters‘ way for the too-fiery rhetoric and the seeming calls to arms against Team Trumpers.

It’s about time.

“[Waters‘ comments] do not become somebody who’s in Congress,” Biggs said, The Hill reported. “So we just introduced it, we have some co-sponsors, but what she did was to basically incite people to come after and attack members of the president’s Cabinet. And also spread that out to more people.”

The measure calls for Waters to step down from office, apologize to the White House “for endangering their lives and sowing seeds of discord,” and acknowledge, in writing, that she was wrong — that harassment and violence aren’t proper ways to express political dissent.

Waters says she’s done nothing wrong, that she can’t help how other people express themselves in public, and that she “believe[s] in peaceful protest.” But that’s hardly believable.

The California congresswoman has been itching for a Trump impeachment since before the day of inauguration, and her rhetoric has gone from fiery and over-the-top to outright insane — and the media has been reporting on this progression at every step of the way. She has no plausible deniability here.

She knows her rhetoric has been an issue. And she’s had plenty of opportunity to repent.

That a fellow member of her House is finally taking up votes to cast her from office is an about-time moment in politics. It’s not that Waters doesn’t have the right, under the First Amendment, to speak as she wishes.

It’s that taxpayers — her bosses — have a right to demand she act as a proper humble public servant. And if she can’t, then these same taxpayers have a right to demand she resign. Biggs‘ resolution only recognizes that reality.

• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter, @ckchumley.

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