House Republicans Prevail on Second Try Impeaching Mayorkas

Maeve Sheehey, Ellen M. Gilmer and Billy House
·4 min read
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(Bloomberg) -- House Republicans voted by the narrowest-possible margin Tuesday night to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, as a lawmaker returned to Washington from cancer treatment to reverse an embarrassing defeat of the charges last week.

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Party leaders rushed to re-do the vote hours before polls closed in a toss-up special election in New York that could give Democrats an extra House seat.

The Cuban-born Mayorkas, 64, the first Latino and immigrant to head the department, becomes the second cabinet member in US history — and the first in almost 150 years — to be impeached. Yet there’s little chance the necessary two-thirds majority of the Democratic-led Senate will vote to convict him and remove him from office.

Republicans pressed the impeachment charges against Mayorkas as the party escalates attacks on the Biden administration’s border enforcement record and backlash against surging migration moves to the center of the presidential campaign.

“House Republicans will be remembered by history for trampling on the Constitution for political gain rather than working to solve the serious challenges at our border,” Homeland Security spokesperson Mia Ehrenberg said in a statement Tuesday night.

The first vote to impeach Mayorkas failed last week after a deadlock, with three Republicans joining all Democrats to oppose the resolution on constitutional grounds. The dissenting GOP lawmakers argued Mayorkas was being impeached over policy differences rather than “the high crimes and misdemeanors” standard set in the Constitution.

Read More: Johnson Suffers Surprise Defeat After Mayorkas Impeachment Fails

Republicans prevailed 214-213 because of the return of Majority Leader Steve Scalise, who was absent last week while undergoing treatment for a rare form of blood cancer.

The vote follows the unraveling of a bipartisan Senate deal to crack down on illegal border crossings and impose new restrictions on migration. Republican support faltered after the party’s presidential front-runner, Donald Trump, attacked the deal, arguing the border legislation would be “a great gift for Democrats.”

Immigration has risen to near the top of voters’ election-year concerns as illegal border crossings soar while inflation eases, unemployment remains low and consumer confidence strengthens. President Joe Biden is vulnerable on the issue, with six in 10 swing-state voters saying he bears responsibility for the migration surge, according to a Bloomberg News/Morning Consult poll.

A Senate impeachment trial would provide House Republicans a high-profile forum to air criticism of Biden’s immigration policies, though Senate Democrats could deny them that opportunity. The Senate could vote to dismiss the charges or take other action to sideline them.

“History will not look kindly on House Republicans for their blatant act of unconstitutional partisanship that has targeted an honorable public servant in order to play petty political games,” Biden said in a statement after the vote.

Read More: Swing-State Voters Blame Biden for Migrant Surge at the Border

The impeachment articles charge Mayorkas with failing to enforce US immigration laws, including a mandate to lock up migrants who cross the border illegally. Congress has never provided enough funding to detain all border-crossers and no administration has done so.

The articles also accuse the secretary of violating public trust by insisting the border was secure and by scrapping several Trump-era border restrictions.

“Secretary Mayorkas has explicitly refused to obey the law,” said House Homeland Security Chairman Mark Green, a Tennessee Republican. “He no longer deserves to keep his job.”

Representative Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, one of the Republicans who opposed the impeachment articles, warned colleagues that impeaching Mayorkas would “set a dangerous new precedent” that could be used against Republicans.

Shortly after Gallagher voted against impeachment last week, he announced he wouldn’t run for reelection, though he said the decision was unrelated.

Democrats panned the Mayorkas effort as a political stunt.

“What are Republicans focusing on? Stupid impeachments and banning abortion,” Representative Ted Lieu, a California Democrat, said.

The only time the House previously impeached a cabinet secretary was 1876, after a congressional committee found evidence Secretary of War William Belknap had been operating a kickback scheme startling even for the scandal-tarnished administration of President Ulysses S Grant. Belknap resigned the same day he was impeached and was acquitted after a Senate trial.

(Updates with DHS comment, in fifth paragraph)

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