On Tuesday evening, the House is expected to vote on the impeachment resolution of DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over his deliberate failure to secure the border and for lying to Congress. As of this writing, the outcome isn't clear. Some Republicans previously signaled their intent to vote against the resolution on the floor, contending that passing it could establish a risky precedent that could backfire on Republicans.
“Let me say there is a crisis on the border. The law needs to be enforced,” Rep. Ken Buck told MSNBC last week. “But if we start going down this path of impeachment with a Cabinet official, we are opening a door as Republicans that we don’t want to open. The next president who is a Republican will face the same scrutiny from Democrats. It’s wrong, and we should not set this precedent."
“I think that it will be looked at as a political gimmick, a stunt. I don’t believe it will be taken seriously by the American public,” he insisted. “Say we were successful in impeaching Mayorkas, and the Senate convicted him, which is very unlikely. What would happen at that point? President Biden would appoint someone else who agreed with his policies, and I don’t believe there would be any remediation on the border.”
In one sense, Buck isn't wrong. But let's be honest here: Democrats lowered the bar for impeachment years ago when they impeached Trump not once, but twice, over dubious accusations. Heck, they were planning his impeachment before Trump took office. They weren't even trying to be subtle about it. On the day he was inaugurated, the Washington Post published an article titled, “The campaign to impeach President Trump has begun.” All they had to do was wait for their moment. As soon as they won a majority in the House, they just needed any excuse they could find to impeach him. They were so desperate to get him for something that they ultimately landed on dubious charges of a quid pro quo from a phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The charges were so weak that even liberal experts were panning it. Naturally, Democrats failed to achieve a conviction.
After the Capitol riot in 2021, Democrats quickly drafted new articles of impeachment, alleging without evidence that Trump had incited the riot. It was a blatant scheme by the Democrats to exploit outrage over the incident to prevent Trump from being able to run for president again. They blatantly weaponized impeachment and did so for partisan purposes. They opened up that can of worms, not Republicans.
Also for our VIPs: The Left is Trying to Flip The Script on the Border Crisis. It Won’t Work.
So, as much as I understand Buck's concerns, Democrats have already proven to themselves they can impeach anyone under dubious circumstances, so what the GOP does with Mayorkas is irrelevant. Make no mistake about it: if Trump wins in November and Democrats take control of the House, they'll make up a new excuse to impeach him for something.
Republicans, however, understand the gravity of impeachment and didn't rush an inquiry into Joe Biden upon winning the majority in the House. They took their time with Mayorkas as well. If allowing an invasion of our country isn't a legitimately impeachable offense, then frankly, what is? The very essence of safeguarding our country's sovereignty is at stake here, and Republicans have been weak when it comes to standing up to Democrats and their corruption for far too long.
