(The Guardian) While taking the Senate is a steeper hill to climb, Republicans have a much better shot of winning a majority in the House of Representatives, where they would have the power to launch impeachment proceedings.
The bigger question is: who would they impeach? And what for?
While some Democrats believe they’ll go straight for Biden himself, CNN reports that a campaign has emerged to impeach homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, whom the GOP complains is at fault for not stopping the flow of migrants and asylum seekers across the southern border with Mexico. Indeed, Republican lawmakers have been campaigning on the border issue in the upcoming midterms, and impeaching Mayorkas could give them the ability to say they’ve made good on that promise, though launching the procedure against a cabinet secretary has only been done once before in American history.
However, the strategy is not without risks, and it’s unclear if enough Republican House lawmakers would back it, or if their leader Kevin McCarthy is on board. Here’s what CNN has to say: GOP Rep. Steve Womack of Arkansas said Republicans “should focus on policy” and “leave some of the other more emotional topics for another day.”
“The risk is if people lose faith in the ability of Congress to even do its basic function,” Womack said of voter blowback for impeaching Mayorkas. “The people that I talk to from all stripes tell me they want a Congress that works – not a Congress that is preoccupied with kind of revenge-type agendas. Because then a lot of other things (that) need to happen don’t get to happen. And then that hurts the country.”
So far, McCarthy has carefully sidestepped impeachment questions, insisting Republicans are not going to pre-determine the outcome but are willing to go wherever the facts and the law lead them. Yet McCarthy has not shut the door on the idea either, particularly when it comes to Mayorkas. And when pressed by CNN on whether Mayorkas is vulnerable to impeachment in a GOP-led House, he replied: “What happens at the border is above everything else.”
The bigger question is: who would they impeach? And what for?
While some Democrats believe they’ll go straight for Biden himself, CNN reports that a campaign has emerged to impeach homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, whom the GOP complains is at fault for not stopping the flow of migrants and asylum seekers across the southern border with Mexico. Indeed, Republican lawmakers have been campaigning on the border issue in the upcoming midterms, and impeaching Mayorkas could give them the ability to say they’ve made good on that promise, though launching the procedure against a cabinet secretary has only been done once before in American history.
However, the strategy is not without risks, and it’s unclear if enough Republican House lawmakers would back it, or if their leader Kevin McCarthy is on board. Here’s what CNN has to say: GOP Rep. Steve Womack of Arkansas said Republicans “should focus on policy” and “leave some of the other more emotional topics for another day.”
“The risk is if people lose faith in the ability of Congress to even do its basic function,” Womack said of voter blowback for impeaching Mayorkas. “The people that I talk to from all stripes tell me they want a Congress that works – not a Congress that is preoccupied with kind of revenge-type agendas. Because then a lot of other things (that) need to happen don’t get to happen. And then that hurts the country.”
So far, McCarthy has carefully sidestepped impeachment questions, insisting Republicans are not going to pre-determine the outcome but are willing to go wherever the facts and the law lead them. Yet McCarthy has not shut the door on the idea either, particularly when it comes to Mayorkas. And when pressed by CNN on whether Mayorkas is vulnerable to impeachment in a GOP-led House, he replied: “What happens at the border is above everything else.”
