LOS ANGELES — Rep. Maxine Waters, an institution of Los Angeles Democratic politics, is facing an upstart challenger from her party seeking to capitalize on the national wave of generational change-seekers.
Myla Rahman, a nonprofit executive, hopes to turn Waters’ 35 years in Congress — and 50 years overall as an elected official — against her, arguing the 87-year-old incumbent has lost touch with her district.
“The community has said that they’d like new energy, a new perspective,” said Rahman in an interview. “And the reality is, the average age is 36 years old in the district. The average person is a renter in the district. So we’ve got a lot of issues that are relatable to my life experience.”
Waters is the rare member of Congress to be both a local icon and a national meme. She gained near-celebrity status in President Donald Trump’s first term as “Auntie Maxine” who regularly lobbed acerbic barbs at the president and his administration. She has maintained an electoral lock on her South Los Angeles district, normally winning with more than 70 or 80 percent of the vote.
That commanding presence has deterred any serious challenge against Waters in decades. But Rahman is aiming to tap into Democrats’ party-wide discontent over their graying representation, spurred on by President Joe Biden’s initial decision to run for reelection in 2024 despite concerns about his advanced age and mental acuity.
In California, long-serving Democratic incumbents like Reps. Brad Sherman and Mike Thompson are facing insurgent campaigns from younger opponents. The generational rift is also roiling the Congressional Black Caucus, whose members are facing challenges from younger Black politicians who argue the old guard is not fighting hard enough for the current political moment.
Rahman, who is 53, pointedly noted Waters has been her representative since she moved into the district at age 6. She said her differences from the congressmember are stylistic, not ideological, and that she considers herself “more energetic, younger, more relatable in terms of the experiences that people face in the district.”
Rahman said she is especially focused on affordable health care after surviving two occurrences of breast cancer. She received her diagnosis the second time just as she was elected city clerk in Carson and stepped down from the role one day after winning because of her health. She is now cancer-free.
Waters’ seniority in Congress has made her a powerful force on the Hill; she is currently the top-ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services committee and is in position to become its chair if the Democrats win control in the midterm elections.
But Waters is not particularly flush in campaign cash, perhaps because she has so rarely faced a serious challenge. She raised roughly $430,000 in 2025 and started the year with less than $150,000 cash on hand.
Rahman initially sought a state legislative seat in 2026 and raised less than $35,000 for her Assembly campaign, most of which she donated herself. But she said she’s “very confident” she’d be competitive fundraising for a congressional seat. She’s hired veteran Democratic consultant Mike Trujillo to work on the campaign.
After working as a high-level staffer for Los Angeles-area legislators, Rahman said she’s well aware her decision to go up against a pillar of the city’s political scene will stir some outrage.
“I’m sure I’ll get a lot of calls. I’m waiting for ‘how dare you? The audacity of you, who do you think you are,’” she said. “And what I can say is that there’s a choice, and this is a democracy. That’s why we have elections, and the voters can decide.”
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