Mayorkas didn’t seem on the listening to however despatched a six-page letter Tuesday morning to Rep. Mark Inexperienced (R-Tenn.), the committee’s chairman, detailing his prolonged profession in public service and pushing again on the GOP’s accusations that he has prevented their oversight requests.
“Now we have supplied Congress and your Committee hours of testimony, hundreds of paperwork, a whole lot of briefings, and far more data that demonstrates fairly clearly how we’re imposing the legislation,” Mayorkas wrote.
His responsiveness to the Home’s oversight requests wouldn’t waver, nonetheless “baseless” the proceedings, he added.
“I guarantee you that your false accusations don’t rattle me and don’t divert me from the legislation enforcement and broader public service to which I stay devoted,” Mayorkas wrote.
Home Republicans introduced two articles of impeachment in opposition to Mayorkas on Sunday, accusing him of “willful and systemic refusal to adjust to the legislation” and breach of the general public belief. Republicans swiftly concluded two public impeachment hearings this month with out Mayorkas’s in-person testimony or testimony from any truth witnesses.
Democrats repeatedly asserted that Republicans don’t have any constitutional foundation to question Mayorkas, dismissing Home Republicans’ arguments that Mayorkas’s actions rise to “excessive crimes and misdemeanors”
Within the first article of impeachment, Republicans argue that Mayorkas has didn’t implement U.S. immigration insurance policies on the nation’s border, has disregarded legal guidelines handed by Congress and has ignored court docket orders, permitting for a surge of migration on the southern border that has resulted in report highs of unlawful crossings in latest months.
“Secretary Mayorkas has put his political preferences above following the legislation,” Inexperienced stated in his opening remarks Tuesday. He later described the letter Mayorkas had despatched him Tuesday morning as “insufficient and unbecoming of a Cupboard secretary.”
The second cost, breach of the general public belief, accuses Mayorkas of creating false statements and obstructing oversight of the Division of Homeland Safety. After little public motion within the probe for a number of months, the Homeland Safety Committee’s investigation got here to a head this month after Inexperienced invited Mayorkas to testify on the committee’s second impeachment listening to.
Mayorkas responded that he had a scheduling battle and supplied to testify on one other date, however Inexperienced declined the provide and moved ahead with the listening to. It was held on a day Mayorkas was getting ready to host a delegation of Mexican officers to debate migration points on the U.S.-Mexico border. He additionally was noticed on the opposite facet of the Capitol, negotiating with the Senate on a border safety deal.
Shortly thereafter, Inexperienced issued a letter outlining 31 requests to the division that he stated remained “partially or solely unhappy,” signaling an obstruction cost to return.
Homeland Safety officers have famous that Mayorkas has already testified earlier than Congress greater than another Cupboard member — 27 instances in 35 months — and that the division has supplied 90 witnesses for committee hearings because the begin of the Biden administration, together with greater than 13,000 pages of paperwork and knowledge in response to Inexperienced’s requests alone.
Even when the Home impeaches Mayorkas, he’s unlikely to be convicted in a trial within the Senate.
Inexperienced informed reporters Tuesday that it didn’t matter if the Senate in the end didn’t convict Mayorkas.
“I’m doing what’s, I believe, my responsibility, and votes shall be what votes are. I really feel fairly good,” Inexperienced stated. “The identical query will get requested. … ‘Are you simply doing one thing that’s going to wind up being fruitless anyway due to the Senate?’ Nicely, tremendous, if that’s what they select to do, however I’ve an obligation to do.”
Mayorkas appeared earlier than the committee in November. However threats to question him have loomed since Home Republicans assumed the bulk, serving as a rallying cry for hard-line lawmakers similar to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who has made repeated efforts to drive an impeachment vote.
Constitutional consultants and Democrats have argued that Republicans are abusing a instrument adopted by the framers of the Structure to guard the nation from despotic management to as a substitute deal with a coverage dispute. Two legislation professors who testified earlier than the committee this month each acknowledged that they didn’t see a constitutional foundation for impeachment.
“Coverage variations will not be impeachable,” stated rating Democrat Bennie G. Thompson (Miss.) in his opening assertion Tuesday, earlier than repeating the sentiment from a constitutional scholar who testified earlier than the committee this month and argued that no different department of presidency has extra energy to handle the disaster on the border than Congress.
In remarks through the committee listening to Tuesday, Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) famous the irony of Republicans making an attempt to question Mayorkas for neglecting his duties whereas the secretary has been actively negotiating with a bipartisan group of senators on border safety laws for 2 months.
Goldman was referring to a bipartisan Senate deal that will tie funding for Ukraine to frame coverage adjustments pushed by Republicans. After former president Donald Trump voiced opposition to the bundle, nonetheless, a number of Home and Senate Republicans have stated they’d not help the measure.
Trump, who’s working for reelection and who decisively gained the GOP’s first two nominating contests this month, blasted the would-be bipartisan deal as a possible political “present” to Democrats throughout an election yr. He additionally bragged about inserting himself into the controversy and stymieing efforts to get the invoice handed, despite the fact that he’s not in workplace.
“The true motive we’re right here, as everyone knows, is as a result of Donald Trump desires to run on immigration as his primary challenge within the November 2024 election — and also you don’t should take my phrase for it as a result of he stated it himself,” Goldman stated Tuesday.
