The Republican-controlled House is set to vote Tuesday on whether to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas—a decision that would mark the first impeachment of a cabinet secretary in nearly 150 years and comes as immigration has become a focal point in this year’s presidential election.
U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas testifies during a House Homeland Security ... [+]
House Homeland Security Chair Mark Green (R-Tenn.) unveiled two articles of impeachment against Mayorkas last month, accusing him and systemic refusal to comply with the law and breach of public trust.
The first article accuses Mayorkas of a “catch and release scheme” for failing to routinely detain undocumented immigrants while they await removal proceedings and paroling them “en masse,” resulting in what the resolution calls “calamitous consequences for the Nation.”
Mayorkas committed “breach of public trust” by telling Congress the border is “secure” and that DHS has “operational control” over the border, statements the resolution describes as “false” and intended to “obscure the devastating consequences” of his border policies.
The resolution hinges on language in the Immigration and Nationality Act that states migrants “shall be detained” while they await court decisions and a 2006 statute that defines “operational control” as zero illegal crossings of migrants or drugs—provisions legal experts have argued are virtually impossible to fully enforce as the federal government doesn’t have the capacity to detain everyone, and previous administrations have also released migrants.
Mayorkas has defended his record, acknowledging problems with the U.S. immigration system, but insisting they “are not new,” he wrote in a letter to Congress, urging it to pass legislation to address border security deficiencies.
DHS has also defended his record, arguing in a memo the agency has technically never had “operational control” of the border, noting that “by the standard of maintaining operational control as defined by the Secure Fence Act, Congress should have impeached every DHS Secretary since the law’s passage.”
Republicans can afford to lose only three votes to pass the resolution under their slim majority in the House, assuming all Democrats vote against it. At least two GOP members, Reps. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) and Tom McClintock (R-Calif.), have vowed to oppose the measure, with Buck declaring that “incompetence is not constitutional grounds for impeachment.” McClintock, in a memo announcing his decision, suggesting Mayorkas is simply following the president’s orders and asking “‘how can he be impeached for not doing his job because he is doing it?’” If the House does vote to formally impeach Mayorkas, the effort would almost certainly fail in the Democratic-controlled Senate, which is responsible for conducting impeachment trials.
Mayorkas has faced stiff GOP criticism for years as arrests of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border remain near record levels, a trend Republicans blame on President Joe Biden’s decision to loosen stringent Trump-era immigration policies, though Biden has linked the surge in migration to crime, political upheaval and poverty in Central America. The renewed push to impeach Mayorkas comes days after the Senate unveiled bipartisan legislation to tighten border controls. The Senate bill would require the president to restrict asylum applications for people who cross the border illegally if border crossings exceed 5,000 per day on average. The legislation faces resistance from Republicans in both chambers as former President Donald Trump has advocated against it, arguing it is a “gift” to Democrats in an election year when migrant encounters have reached record-high levels and is a top priority for voters.
A coalition of immigration law experts have argued Mayorkas has not broken any laws to merit impeachment. Michael Chertoff, former homeland security secretary under President George W. Bush, argued in a Wall Street Journal op-ed Congress has not given the agency the adequate tools to enforce the border, noting that DHS removed, returned or expelled more noncitizens since May than in any five-month period over the past 20 years. A group of 25 constitutional law experts also said in a recent letter to Congress the charges “come nowhere close to meeting the constitutional threshold for impeachment,” arguing the framers of the Constitution “made a conscious choice not to allow impeachment for mere ‘maladministration.’”
Congress has impeached only one other cabinet secretary: William Belknap, secretary of war under President Ulysses Grant, in 1876, accusing him of accepting bribes in exchange for government contracts. He was acquitted on all five articles of impeachment in a Senate trial.