The House is scheduled to vote Tuesday afternoon on impeaching Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, but the outcome isn’t at all assured. It’s a numbers game for Republican leadership, with two party members publicly opposing impeachment and a handful undecided. The very slim majority of Republicans means that leadership can likely lose only three of their members and pass the impeachment resolution.
The latest Republican “no” vote comes from Rep. Tom McClintock of California, who announced his opposition Tuesday morning. “Do Republicans really wish to establish an expansive view of impeachment that will surely be turned against conservatives on the Supreme Court or a future Republican president if Congress changes hands?” McClintock wrote in his statement. He joined Rep. Ken Buck of Coloradowho was the first Republican to publicly say he’d vote against impeachment.
In addition to McClintock and Buck, Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin voiced his reservations in a conference meeting Tuesday morning, saying that this would lower the standard for impeachment. And there are at least three Republicans who have publicly declared they are undecided: Reps. David Joyce of Ohio, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, and Patrick McHenry of North Carolina, the former speaker pro tempore.
The Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green of Tennessee apparently didn’t make a compelling case for the principles of impeaching Mayorkas during that Tuesday morning meeting, instead attacking Mayorkas personally, calling him“a reptile with no balls” because he refused to resign. That’s hardly a principled argument for high crimes and misdemeanors.
This impeachment is purely political and entirely baseless, and most Republicans know it. Also this:
That helps Democrats make the case against it, pointing out that impeachment is no solution to what Republicans like to call the border crisis, and that it’s purely a political distraction. Here’s a statement from President Joe Biden’s administration:
Impeaching Secretary Mayorkas would be an unprecedented and unconstitutional act of political retribution that would do nothing to solve the challenges our Nation faces in securing the border. […]
The impeachment power was never intended as a device for members of an opposing political party to harass Executive Branch officials over policy disputes. […]
Impeaching Secretary Mayorkas would trivialize this solemn constitutional power and invite more partisan abuse of this authority in the future.
It’s as likely as not that all but three Republicans fall into line with their MAGA counterparts and move ahead with this baseless impeachment—one that’s sure to be buried by the Senate. This is yet another test of principle for Republicans, and one that the majority will gleefully fail.
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