Washington DC - The US House of Representatives voted 216-210 on Tuesday to reject a Republican effort to censure Democratic Representative Maxine Waters of California over her comments to protesters last weekend.

The vote came shortly before the jury in the trial of former Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin found him guilty on all three charges, including second-degree murder, in the killing of George Floyd.

Waters was recorded at a demonstration in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, last weekend, in response to the police shooting of Daunte Wright.

The Democrat said that if Chauvin were not convicted, "then we know that we’ve got to not only stay in the street, but we’ve got to fight for justice."

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"We’ve got to get more active. We’ve got to get more confrontational. You’ve got to make sure that they know that we mean business," she had insisted.

Republicans quickly criticized the comments, accusing her of instigating violence. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, a Republican from California., brought a censure resolution against her.

Waters brushed aside the criticism, saying she has always promoted nonviolence and accusing Republicans of "bullying" her.

During the vote on the censure resolution, Waters stood confidently in the well of the House, chatting with other lawmakers and occasionally glancing up at a vote tally in the chamber.

"I love my colleagues, and they love me," she said after the vote. "I don’t want to do anything to hurt them or hurt their chances for reelection. I will make sure that they are comfortable with my kind of advocacy so that we can all be sure that we can do the right thing."

Derek Chauvin was convicted on all counts of murdering George Floyd after less than a full day of deliberation by the Minneapolis jury.