Current:Home > BackHouse to vote on Alejandro Mayorkas impeachment again after failed first attempt-InfoLens
House to vote on Alejandro Mayorkas impeachment again after failed first attempt
View Date:2024-12-23 14:48:55
Washington — The House on Tuesday is expected to vote for a second time in a week to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas after Republican leaders suffered an embarrassing defeat in their first effort.
Mayorkas narrowly survived last week's vote after a small group of Republicans, who said President Biden's border chief did not commit impeachable offenses for his handling of the U.S.-Mexico border crisis, voted with all Democrats to sink it.
Republicans vowed they would try again once House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, who had been undergoing cancer treatment, returned to Washington. The Louisiana Republican will be back at work this week, giving them another vote that is expected to tip the scale in their favor, barring any absences.
The vote comes the same day as a special election in New York's third congressional district to replace former GOP Rep. George Santos, which could further narrow the House's Republican majority. The possibility of Democrats picking up the swing seat puts pressure on Republicans to move quickly with another vote.
House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, a Minnesota Republican, expressed confidence on Tuesday that the vote would be successful this time.
"All the Republicans will be back and it'll pass," he said.
In a statement Tuesday, the Department of Homeland Security said the impeachment push was "pointless," "unconstitutional" and "baseless."
The impeachment case against Mayorkas
Republicans assert Mayorkas should be charged with high crimes and misdemeanors for not enforcing immigration laws. They've focused much of their arguments on the failure to detain all migrants while they await court proceedings.
Mayorkas and Democrats have contended that it's a matter of policy differences, arguing that Republicans are using impeachment to score political points during an election year. They say it's up to Congress to fix the "broken" immigration system and allocate more resources to border security.
Legal experts on both sides of the aisle have also criticized the effort, saying Mayorkas' actions fail to meet the threshold for impeachment.
Last month, Republicans unveiled two articles of impeachment against Mayorkas after speeding through impeachment proceedings.
The first impeachment article accuses Mayorkas of releasing migrants into the U.S. who should have been detained. The second article alleges he lied to lawmakers about whether the southern border was secure when he previously testified that his department had "operational control" of the border, and accuses Mayorkas of obstructing congressional oversight of his department.
The Department of Homeland Security has said Congress has never given the executive branch the resources and personnel needed to detain every migrant as required by federal immigration law. It also denied Mayorkas lied to lawmakers, pointing to how the department uses "operational control" internally.
"The problems with our broken and outdated immigration system are not new," Mayorkas wrote last month in a letter to Rep. Mark Green of Tennessee, the Republican chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. "We need a legislative solution and only Congress can provide it."
Mayorkas also said the push to impeach him had not shaken him.
"I assure you that your false accusations do not rattle me and do not divert me from the law enforcement and broader public service mission to which I have devoted most of my career and to which I remain devoted," he previously wrote in a letter to the committee.
Republican leaders went ahead with last week's nail-biter of a floor vote amid uncertainty about whether they had enough support to impeach Mayorkas.
It looked like the vote was going to succeed, with three GOP defections, until Rep. Al Green was unexpectedly wheeled onto the floor in his hospital scrubs after intestinal surgery. The Texas Democrat tied the vote at 215-215, defeating the resolution.
A fourth Republican also switched his vote at the last minute to give GOP leaders the opportunity to bring up the vote again, making the final vote 214 in favor to 216 against.
Scalise was the only lawmaker absent from the vote.
One of the Republican lawmakers who broke with his party, Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, said in a Wall Street Journal piece last week that the GOP is setting "a dangerous new precedent that would be used against future Republican administrations." Gallagher announced days after the impeachment vote that he would not seek reelection.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, told reporters Tuesday he is not concerned about setting a precedent by impeaching Mayorkas, saying it "is an exceptional case in U.S. history."
"The House has a constitutional responsibility, as I've said many times, probably the heaviest next to a declaration of war, and we have to do our job regardless of what the other chamber does," Johnson said.
If impeached, the charges against Mayorkas are unlikely to go far in the Senate, where Democrats have control and a two-thirds majority would be needed to convict and remove him from office.
Ellis Kim and Patrick Maguire contributed reporting.
- In:
- U.S.-Mexico Border
- Impeachment
- Alejandro Mayorkas
Caitlin Yilek is a politics reporter at cbsnews.com and is based in Washington, D.C. She previously worked for the Washington Examiner and The Hill, and was a member of the 2022 Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellowship with the National Press Foundation.
TwitterveryGood! (49)
Related
- American Idol’s Triston Harper, 16, Expecting a Baby With Wife Paris Reed
- Flood watch in Vermont as state marks anniversary of last year’s severe inundations
- Maryland governor proposing budget cuts to address future shortfalls
- WNBA rookie power rankings: Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese top list after record performances
- Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin to kick off fundraising effort for Ohio women’s suffrage monument
- Kate Beckinsale sheds light on health troubles, reveals what 'burned a hole' in esophagus
- Death of man pinned by hotel guards in Milwaukee is reviewed as a homicide, prosecutors say
- Samsung brings tech’s latest fashion to wearable technology with AI twists in new watch and ring
- Vermont man is fit to stand trial over shooting of 3 Palestinian college students
- Kevin, Frankie Jonas on their childhood, 'Claim to Fame' Season 3
Ranking
- Research reveals China has built prototype nuclear reactor to power aircraft carrier
- Groups sue to restore endangered species protection for US northern Rockies wolves
- NHTSA opens an investigation into 94k recalled Jeep Wrangler vehicles: What to know
- US women's gymnastics teams will sparkle at Paris Olympics
- One person is dead after a shooting at Tuskegee University
- What Gypsy Rose Blanchard Said About Motherhood Months Before Pregnancy Reveal
- Armed man fatally shot in gunfire exchange at Yellowstone National Park identified
- More Indigenous youth are learning to spearfish, a connection to ancestors and the land
Recommendation
-
'Serial swatter': 18-year-old pleads guilty to making nearly 400 bomb threats, mass shooting calls
-
Horoscopes Today, July 9, 2024
-
Off the Grid: Sally breaks down USA TODAY's daily crossword puzzle, Split Peas
-
Virginia joins other states with effort to restrict cellphones in schools
-
Jennifer Lopez Gets Loud in Her First Onstage Appearance Amid Ben Affleck Divorce
-
McDonald's brings back Smoky BLT Quarter Pounder with Cheese: See when you can get it
-
More details released in autopsy for gunman who shot and killed four officers in Charlotte
-
Pete Rose docuseries coming to HBO this month, will look at lifetime ban and more