By Abigail Gilder
Staff Writer
The Republican party failed to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas earlier this week.
On Feb. 6, the impeachment charges moved to the House floor for a vote. Not only did this impeachment fail, but it failed narrowly, in a final vote of 214 to 216. The division present in the Republican party has become potentially problematic with some of its own representatives voicing their disagreements with the actions of other members. For example, Rep. Tom McClintock even went so far as to say that the Republicans “stretch and distort the Constitution” in continuing with these impeachment charges against Mayorkas, according to AP News.
The impeachment, approved by the Republican party in the House of Representatives in the House Homeland Security Committee, charged Mayorkas with breaching “public trust” as a result of the recent upwards trend in illegal immigration and the failure to enforce national immigration laws. These claims are largely based on Mayorkas’ “willful and systemic refusal to comply with the law” in regards to enforcing immigration laws and border policy, according to NPR.
While this conflict of illegal immigration has been occurring for a while, with the upcoming election, Republicans are focusing on this issue more and more due to it being one of their platform’s top election issues, according to TIME.
Furthermore, the Democratic Party and legal experts have criticized this Republican move, claiming that the actions of Mayorkas are “hardly grounds for impeachment.” Democratic Representative from Massachusetts, Jim McGovern, even called the charges “a bunch of garbage,” according to AP News.
In his recently published ten-page memo, McClintock criticized Mayorkas, stating that “the border is a disaster,” and yet held that there was still no impeachable offense, according to CBS News.
According to The Guardian, House Speaker Mike Johnson expressed the intention to retry the vote in the House in the coming weeks, although an official date has not yet been released.
