Why the Georgia Congresswoman’s quixotic moves to impeach President Biden and numerous other administration officials could blow back on the GOP
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) has been trying to impeach President Biden since his first full day in office, and her most recent resolution to impeach the president was at least her sixth.
It was part of a week that Greene called “Impeachment Week,” when she pushed to also impeach several other administration officials, including Attorney General Merrick Garland, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, FBI Director Christopher Wray and U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves.
All of those people, needless to say, remain in office. And in fact, none of Greene’s impeachment efforts have moved forward in any way. For all the talk about Greene’s alliance with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, there’s no indication that McCarthy and the rest of the House Republican leadership want any part of impeaching Biden. And not only that, but “Impeachment Week” took place while the political world’s attention was focused on the debt ceiling negotiations, rather than on what Greene was up to.
But that could change, at least with respect to Mayorkas. That’s because, per The Hill, Greene implied that she would only vote for the debt limit deal if she got a commitment from House leadership to move forward with some type of impeachment.
A Washington Post op-ed Tuesday by Greg Sargent looked at why Greene’s impeachment pushes may come back to bite the GOP.
The House Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing this week called “The Border Crisis: Is the Law Being Faithfully Executed?” The hearing will “will examine the Department of Homeland Security’s policies that violate the law and encourage illegal immigration.” The witnesses before the committee will include three conservative individuals: Former Acting Secretary, Department of Homeland Security Chad Wolf, former Acting Director, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Joseph Edlow and Heritage Foundation fellow Steven Bradbury.
The Post op-ed suggests that the hearing means Congress is “starting down the road toward impeaching Mayorkas, just as Greene wants.”
The writer believes this is a mistake.
“This will blow back on the GOP. Greene’s linking of Mayorkas to the unrelated debt limit vote has handed Democrats a weapon against the coming impeachment circus,” Sargent wrote. “For vulnerable House Republicans who want to tout their support for the bipartisan debt deal, the last thing they need is a nakedly partisan charade led by Greene.”
Greene had planned to predicate a Mayorkas impeachment push on an expected spike in border crossings following the lifting of Title 42 last month. But that spike never materialized, due to “President Biden’s draconian legal limits on asylum-seeking at the border paired with expanding pathways to apply from abroad.” Regardless, Republicans continue to characterize the Biden Administration’s border policies as “open borders.”
“The truth is that Republicans like Greene want to impeach Mayorkas because of policy differences, which aren’t impeachable offenses,” Sargent writes. “Republicans regularly rage at Biden for reversing Trump policies such as expelling undocumented migrant kids and forcing migrants to wait in Mexico for hearings, which led to awful humanitarian outcomes.”
CNN had reported back in January that moderates in the Republican caucus are skeptical about the idea of impeaching Mayorkas. And with the GOP holding such a slim majority in the House, they may lack the votes to impeach the Homeland Security secretary.
If impeached, Mayorkas would be the first cabinet secretary to be impeached since William Belknap, the secretary of war, in 1876, although Belknap was acquitted in the Senate. With a Democratic Senate majority, Mayorkas would likely be acquitted as well, should it get to that point.
One Democrat in the House, and frequent Greene opponent, echoed that point.
“We need to hammer this home,” Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA), told the Post. “The only reason she voted for paying America’s bills is that she was going to get this chaos journey of impeaching Mayorkas that she always wanted.”
Expertise and Experience:
Stephen Silver is a Senior Editor for 19FortyFive. He is an award-winning journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.
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