House speaker takes early vacation before he can humiliate himself even more

Posted on February 15, 2024 by Joan McCarter

Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson might have wanted to take a victory lap after finally getting Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas impeached on Tuesday. Instead, the House descended into chaos again on Wednesday, and Johnson decided to call it quits on the week. Key votes scheduled for Thursday and Friday were canceled, and the House left midday Thursday for almost two weeks. It’s so bad that Republicans, including some in leadership, are running to the Capitol Hill press to complain about him and openly questioning his competence.

Wednesday hadn’t even ended before the headlines like “Republicans admit it. Kevin McCarthy has never looked so good” started appearing. It started off badly the night before, when Democrats flipped the seat of expelled New York Republican George Santos, further chipping away at the GOP’s already tiny House majority. A series of leadership missteps and acts of defiance against Johnson followed.

Rep. Mark Green of Tennessee—the committee chair responsible for the Mayorkas impeachment—announced on Wednesday that he was retiring at the end of his term because, as he told Axios, “This place is so broken.” He’s the fifth powerful committee chair to call it quits.
Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio, who heads up the Intelligence Committee, went rogue on Wednesday, issuing an alarmist and vague warning about "a serious national security threat," and forcing Johnson to assure reporters that "there is no need for public alarm."
Johnson suffered another embarrassing failure on the floor on Wednesday as well, when the usual crowd of Freedom Caucus maniacs tanked another procedural vote. This is the sixth time in this Republican majority that a rule vote was defeated. This used to be rare—the last time it happened was more than 20 years ago.
And finally, also on Wednesday, Johnson pulled (for the second time in three months) a scheduled vote on a bill to overhaul FISA because he hasn’t been able to unify the conference behind one bill. Johnson’s team failed the basics of counting, announcing the vote before the votes got locked down.

All of this has Republicans, including some in leadership, anonymously telling reporters that they’re running out of patience with him. And some are going on the record.

“Watching Speaker Johnson, who I have great respect for, grow up has been really fascinating. I just hope he has the time to finish growing up,” Rep. Frank Lucas of Oklahoma told Punchbowl News. One senior Republican said that Johnson’s leadership “feels like chaos. Rudderless.”

“I’m as confused as ever about what he wants,” a House Republican insider told Politico. “He hasn’t given us any direction. … I think right now he’s in survival mode.” Another senior GOP member said, “[Former Speaker] Kevin [McCarthy] would have a strategy, he’d shop it around, then he’d make a play call… The more I’m around Johnson, the more it’s clear to me he doesn’t have a plan.” And yet another aide told Politico, “Not sure what the speaker wants to do on that—as with most things, he’s all over the place.”

“We’re in a bad spot, and that’s the understatement of the century.” That’s a leadership source talking to Punchbowl News’ Jake Sherman.

So Johnson’s House is packing up and leaving midday Thursday, a day earlier than scheduled, for a nearly two-week Presidents’ Day break. They’ll return on Feb. 28, just two days before the first government shutdown deadline, on March 1. Wheeeee!

Defense bill deal made, hard-right House members fume

Freedom Caucus member quits House after complaining Congress is 'so broken'

Ohhhhh yeah! Democrats kicked ass and then some in Tuesday's special election in New York, so of course we're talking all about it on this week's episode of "The Downballot." Co-hosts David Nir and David Beard explain how Tom Suozzi's win affects the math for Democrats' plan to take back the House, then dive into the seemingly bottomless list of excuses Republicans have been making to handwave their defeat away. The bottom line: Suozzi effectively neutralized attacks on immigration—and abortion is still a huge loser for the GOP.

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Speaker Mike Johnson finds time for impeachment stunt, but not to help Ukraine

Posted on February 14, 2024 by Joan McCarter

House Speaker Mike Johnson has plenty of excuses for not taking up the Ukraine aid package the Senate passed early this week, saying that he’s just got too many serious issues on his plate to help in the fight for democracy against Russian totalitarianism. He told reporters Wednesday morning that “we have to address this seriously, to actually solve the problems and not just take political posturing as has happened in some of these other corners.”

Reporter: You yourself were part of killing the senate compromise bill. You say there need to be solutions, what are house Republicans doing to get to a solution on the border and on Ukraine? Or are you going to actually do nothing? pic.twitter.com/3CjaN9BCx0
— Acyn (@Acyn) February 14, 2024

Yes, he seriously accused Ukraine aid proponents of “political posturing” just hours after he led House Republicans in their second—barely successful—sham impeachment vote of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. By the way, that reporter’s question was spot on. Johnson effectively killed the original Senate bill that included a border security package by saying it would be dead on arrival in the House. Now he complains that the aid bill “has not one word about the border.”

Johnson also insists that he’s too busy figuring out how to avoid a government shutdown on March 1 and that it will take time for his team to “process” the Senate’s package. Guess what’s not on the House schedule this week? That’s right: Any appropriations bills to fund the government ahead of the looming deadline. Again, he was able to carve out more time to impeach Mayorkas and to force the Senate to deal with that just days before the government funding deadline.

The Senate is out until Feb. 26 and is going to have to deal with the Mayorkas impeachment as soon as they return. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer outlined the process in a statement, indicating that the House impeachment managers will “present the articles of impeachment to the Senate” as soon as they’re back in, and “[s]enators will be sworn in as jurors in the trial the next day.”

Which means two days of valuable Senate time will be wasted on this because the Senate will never vote to convict Mayorkas, but they have to deal with it anyway. They’ll dispense with it as quickly as the Senate can do anything, but they need every hour for the long process of passing the bills to keep the government from shutting down.

That process between the House and Senate is going nowhere fast because of all the poison-pill riders about abortion, contraception, and trans issues the House Republicans crammed into their spending bills.

On top of all that, Johnson—who just spent an embarrassing week and a half of floor time impeaching one of Biden’s cabinet members—is now demanding that Biden take him seriously and have a face-to-face meeting with him on the Ukraine bill. A White House spokesperson told NBC that Johnson “needed to wrap the negotiations he has having with himself and stop delaying national security needs in the name of politics.” Biden is not included to help Johnson out of this one.

“That body language says: ‘I know I’m in a tough spot. Please bail me out,’” one Democrat involved with the supplemental aid package told NBC.

House GOP votes to impeach Mayorkas, after failing first attempt

House GOP to launch critical investigation into just how old Biden is

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House GOP to launch critical investigation into just how old Biden is

Posted on February 13, 2024 by Joan McCarter

Who could have predicted that House Republicans would use special counsel Robert Hur’s report on President Joe Biden’s document handling for their political purposes? Hur found that while Biden “willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency,” there was not enough evidence to “establish Mr. Biden’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.”

In the absence of actionable malfeasance on the document handling, Hur—a former United States attorney in Maryland, appointed by Donald Trump—did the next best thing he could for his Republican pals: the gratuitous hits on Biden’s age.

Enter three House committee chairs and a new avenue of investigation: Biden’s fitness as president. Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan, and Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith wrote to Attorney General Merrick Garland Monday evening demanding both a transcript and any video recordings of Biden’s interview, with a Feb. 19 deadline for a response.

Axios reports that the Republicans are planning hearings starring Hur in which they will focus on Biden’s mental acuity, the national security implications of his document handling (to give “investigations” the gloss of legitimacy), and his fitness to lead. “Someone might ask him if Biden is unfit to lead,” a leadership source told Axios. “Give him a chance to frame it.”

Might? They “might” ask Hur about Biden’s fitness? They “might” take this chance to exploit Biden’s age, his biggest political liability with voters, and run with it? They absolutely will give Hur a microphone and put him in front of cameras and the traditional media will absolutely eat it up.

While Republicans are at it, Axios reports, they plan to go after Garland and how the Justice Department conducted the investigation. Call it Comer and Jordan’s revenge for the fact that they haven’t been able to get anything implicating Biden and his son Hunter from the Department of Justice for their sham impeachment.

Jordan and Comer have the blessing of their leadership to do this. Speaker Mike Johnson, Majority Leader Steve Scalise, GOP Whip Tom Emmer, and Conference Chair Elise Stefanik released a statement last week calling Hur’s remarks on Biden’s age some of the “most disturbing parts” of the report. “A man too incapable of being held accountable for mishandling classified information is certainly unfit for the Oval Office,” they said.

You might think that those four would have more pressing stuff to deal with, like the fact that there’s another government shutdown looming in a few weeks. Or maybe figuring out how to clean up the horrible messes Johnson has created with his inept leadership. Or just doing anything that would benefit the American people.

Actually, you probably wouldn’t think that. Why would they change course now?

Speaker Mike Johnson had a stunningly awful day—and he did it to himself

Trump allies ridicule GOP impeachment inquiry for failing to find dirt on Biden

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Speaker Mike Johnson is getting squeezed from all sides on Ukraine aid

Posted on February 12, 2024 by Joan McCarter

The Senate voted to move forward on the $95 billion aid bill for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan in the first-ever Super Bowl Sunday session. The vote was 67-27, meaning that it will easily pass in the Senate when they finally get to it. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul has been up to his usual obstructing tricks, refusing to agree to shortening the debate time on the bill. That means it will likely not pass until Wednesday, when all the pressure will be on House Speaker Mike Johnson to either get this bill done or prove his MAGA mettle and block it.

There’s a threat looming over Johnson from Georgia’s contribution to the dumbing-down of the nation, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has said she will bring a motion to oust him as speaker if he puts Ukraine aid on the floor. In aid of Greene’s MAGA cause, GOP Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio is circulating a conspiracy theory that the bill contains a setup to impeach Donald Trump again if he is reelected in November. The theory goes that because the bill extends aid into 2025, Trump would either be forced to honor it or face another impeachment if he cancels it.

That’s an implicit warning to House Republicans—and Johnson—to stay on Trump’s good side and block the aid. But Johnson is getting plenty of pressure from the pro-Ukraine side, including from a powerful Republican.

House Intelligence Committee Chair Mike Turner, an Ohio Republican, recently led a delegation of members to Ukraine, where he met with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to assure him that he had allies among Republicans in Congress and that U.S. aid would continue. He returned with an urgent message for Johnson and Congress. The situation is so bad, he told Politico, that Ukrainian troops “are already rationing munitions” and “are unable to fully defend themselves on the battlefield.”

“We have to get this done,” he continued. “This is no longer an issue of, ‘When do we support Ukraine?’ If we do not move, this will be abandoning Ukraine.” He predicts that there will be “overwhelming support” for the bill in the House, adding, “The speaker will need to bring it to the floor.”

It isn’t an empty threat, because Democrats have the tool to go over Johnson's head to put the bill on the floor with a discharge petition, and House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries is ready to use it. “House Democrats are prepared to use every available legislative tool to make sure we get comprehensive national security legislation over the finish line,” Jeffries said during the annual House Democrats’ strategy retreat last week. He called on Johnson to “move to consider parallel national security legislation immediately.”

The discharge petition needs 218 signatures to be put on the floor. That means as of now, they need six Republicans to join them. That math could change a little depending on the result of tomorrow’s special election in New York to replace expelled Republican George Santos. If Democrat Tom Suozzi wins, Democrats will need just five Republicans, and it sounds like Turner might be willing to be one of them.

So might Nebraska Republican Rep. Don Bacon. "I know we need to get aid to Israel quickly, and it’s in our national security interests to keep Ukraine independent and help Ukrainians defeat Russia’s barbaric invasion by sending them military weapons,” he told Politico last week. “I’ll work with the likeminded folks and the Speaker to determine what is best way to move forward.”

There is strong support for Ukraine even among House Republicans—101 of them voted for it as recently as September. If this new package makes it to the floor, it will surely pass. Which means the stunningly incompetent Johnson has a tough decision to make: stand with Ukraine or stand with Trump?

Republicans get Ukraine demands met, so of course they change their minds

Speaker Mike Johnson had a stunningly awful day—and he did it to himself

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Speaker Mike Johnson had a stunningly awful day—and he did it to himself

Posted on February 7, 2024 by Joan McCarter

House Speaker Mike Johnson is no Nancy Pelosi. In fact, he just put himself in the running for the worst speaker in the modern age, surpassing even ousted Speaker Kevin McCarthy with unforced errors. His ineptitude was on full display Tuesday when he plowed ahead with two critical bills, knowing there was a very good chance of defeat. That’s either hubris—believing he could bully his way through—or wishful thinking, but either way, it’s incompetence.

Let’s start with the failed vote on impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Impeaching a cabinet secretary is a very big deal. It hasn’t been tried since 1876, when the House impeached Secretary of War William Belknap for blatant corruption, taking kickbacks to fund an extravagant lifestyle. Even then, the Senate voted to acquit (though Belknap had already resigned). So what Johnson was doing with this impeachment resolution would already have been historical, even if it hadn’t been so blatantly unjustified. This is the epitome of the kind of vote you don’t gamble on, but that’s exactly what Johnson did.

He brought the resolution to the floor Tuesday, knowing that three Republicans opposed it. Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, who was supposedly the surprise “no” vote that tanked the resolution, says he had been telling leadership for months that he was against the impeachment. And while Johnson also knew that every Democrat would vote against it, he rolled the dice on Democratic Rep. Al Green not being present—and Johnson lost, which he also knew could happen.

As if that weren’t bad enough, Johnson made his day worse by pushing through a stand-alone Israel assistance bill that needed a two-thirds majority to pass. He knew that a majority of Democrats opposed it. He knew it would fail, and he inexplicably went with it anyway, apparently thinking he could blame the Democrats for defeating it. The end result, however, is that pro-Israel groups are now worried that this sends a message that Congress is divided on support.

Is Johnson feeling any chagrin over this debacle? Nope. It’s not his fault. Asked by reporters why he gambled on the impeachment resolution, he said, “[D]emocracy is messy. … We have a razor-thin margin here, and every vote counts. Sometimes, when you’re counting votes and people show up when they’re not expected to be in the building, it changes the equation.” Those tricky Democrats, all showing up to stand for the principle that you can’t impeach an official over a policy dispute.

Asked about criticism of his leadership and inexperience, including from his fellow Republicans, he said, “I don’t think that this is a reflection on the leader. It’s a reflection on the body itself and the place where we’ve come in this country.” That’s definitely hubris because it is all a reflection on his leadership.

You know who else had a razor-thin majority in a deeply divided Congress? That’s right, Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi, who would have never allowed such a humiliating defeat to happen. In the previous session of Congress, with the slimmest Democratic majority in the House in roughly 80 years, Pelosi passed massive legislation, including the Inflation Reduction Act, American Rescue Plan Act, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and the CHIPS and Science Act, all of which are helping drive the U.S. economy’s strong comeback.

Johnson’s going to try again on the impeachment resolution when Republican Rep. Steve Scalise returns following medical treatment, and on the Israel funding bill next week, but the outcome isn’t any more certain on either. Scalise might be able to return from his stem cell transplant recovery soon, or he might not. The special election to replace the expelled Rep. George Santos in New York next Tuesday could go to a Republican, or it could reduce the GOP majority by one more vote. And while Johnson is considering putting the Israel bill back on the floor through the rules process so it would just need a simple majority vote, that’s a dicey plan. One of the hard-line GOP Rules Committee members, Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie, is publicly trashing his leadership, saying replacing McCarthy has “officially turned into an unmitigated disaster.”

Johnson has demonstrated his incompetence and turned far-right members against him multiple times over. This debacle will only make the hard-liners madder and more ungovernable, and everyone else in the GOP conference frustrated. And this is what he has to work with to fund the government in about a month’s time.

The honeymoon is definitely over for Speaker Mike Johnson

Defense bill deal made, hard-right House members fume

Republicans demanded border security, worked on a compromise deal with Democrats, and now want to blow the whole thing up. Biden is promising to remind Americans every day that the Republican Party is at fault for the lack of solutions to the problems they claim are most important.

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Rep. Matt Gaetz wants to force House GOP to take a Trump loyalty test

Posted on February 7, 2024 by Walter Einenkel

On Tuesday, Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz and honorary “Florida man” Rep. Elise Stefanik, and 64 House Republicans presented a resolution to declare that Donald Trump “did not engage in insurrection or rebellion” related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. Gaetz began the press conference by saying “We are here today to authoritatively express that President Trump did not commit an insurrection,”

More importantly, Gaetz made it clear that he plans to use this as a MAGA purity test. After thanking Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio for filing a companion bill in the Senate, Gaetz said, “And now it's time for members of the House and Senate to show where they stand on this question.” And just like that, Gaetz’s remarks were followed by a series of Republicans praising dear leader Trump and saying how the insurrection on Jan. 6 was a concoction by “leftists.”

“[What] we have seen is mass hysteria caused by you, the reckless leftist media,” said Rep. Andy Biggs. “That's what we've seen.”

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Stefanik flanked Gaetz during the press conference, suggesting they’ve patched things up since the two spent October bickering at one another’s expense. Gaetz’s resolution reads in its entirety:

Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that former President Donald J. Trump did not engage in insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or give aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.

You can flip the paper over if you don’t believe me.

The idea that after hundreds of arrests, convictions, and prison sentences—as well as a congressional investigation that left very little to the imagination about how very much Trump and his allies orchestrated the insurrection—the horrors of Jan. 6 should be forgotten with a single-sentence resolution is almost hallucinogenic! It also signals how Trump and his supporters expect the GOP to fall in line. Those who sign on to Gaetz’s resolution will be on a list that Trump can point to and threaten Republican officials with for however long he lives.

As of now, two names are conspicuously absent from the list of sponsors of the bill: Reps. Jim Jordan and James Comer, both of whom have been doing Trump’s dirty work as chairs of House oversight committees.

Maybe they are too busy not finding evidence of wrongdoing by President Biden to sign on to a bill as ludicrous as this one. But as former Rep. Liz Cheney knows, Jordan will surely sign on to any bill pretending that Jan. 6, 2021, never happened.

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House GOP’s unprecedented stunt to impeach Mayorkas fails

Posted on February 6, 2024 by Joan McCarter

In a stunning collapse, House Republicans failed Tuesday to approve the impeachment resolution against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, with four Republicans voting against it. Reps. Ken Buck of Colorado, Tom McClintock of California, Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, and Blake Moore of Utah—who switched his vote at the last minute to be able to bring it to a vote again—joined Democrats to defeat the resolution.

One of those Republicans had an all-too rare moment of honesty in this debate, with McClintock calling the impeachment what it was: a “stunt.”

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“Cabinet secretaries can't serve two masters. They can be impeached for committing a crime related to their office but not for carrying out presidential policy,” McClintock said Tuesday on the floor, adding that this issue is one that needs to be decided at the ballot box in November. “I'm afraid that stunts like this don't help."

How much of a stunt is it? Republicans have tacitly admitted that the move has been purely political from the beginning, driven as it was by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene. In fact, Greene is so instrumental to this impeachment push that prior to the vote, it was reported that she had been tapped to be an impeachment manager in the Senate, presenting the supposed case to the chamber.

It’s also nearly unprecedented. The House hasn’t attempted to impeach a Cabinet member since 1876. But what’s more unprecedented is the House leadership advancing such an historic vote when the outcome was uncertain. Democratic Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi would never have dreamed of bringing a vote of this magnitude to the floor without knowing she had the votes to get it done—nor would former GOP Speakers Paul Ryan or John Boehner have done so, for that matter.

Instead, newbie Speaker Mike Johnson played to his MAGA base. “There is no other measure for Congress to take but this one,” Johnson told reporters Tuesday, ahead of the vote. “It’s an extreme measure, but extreme times call for extreme measures.”

Watch: Republicans slammed for 'debasing and demeaning' the Constitution

Republicans admit impeaching Mayorkas is all politics

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Yes, the House GOP really will try to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas

Posted on February 6, 2024 by Joan McCarter

The House is scheduled to vote Tuesday afternoon on impeaching Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, but the outcome isn’t at all assured. It’s a numbers game for Republican leadership, with two party members publicly opposing impeachment and a handful undecided. The very slim majority of Republicans means that leadership can likely lose only three of their members and pass the impeachment resolution.

The latest Republican “no” vote comes from Rep. Tom McClintock of California, who announced his opposition Tuesday morning. “Do Republicans really wish to establish an expansive view of impeachment that will surely be turned against conservatives on the Supreme Court or a future Republican president if Congress changes hands?” McClintock wrote in his statement. He joined Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado, who was the first Republican to publicly say he’d vote against impeachment.

In addition to McClintock and Buck, Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin voiced his reservations in a conference meeting Tuesday morning, saying that this would lower the standard for impeachment. And there are at least three Republicans who have publicly declared they are undecided: Reps. David Joyce of Ohio, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, and Patrick McHenry of North Carolina, the former speaker pro tempore.

The Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green of Tennessee apparently didn’t make a compelling case for the principles of impeaching Mayorkas during that Tuesday morning meeting, instead attacking Mayorkas personally, calling him, “a reptile with no balls” because he refused to resign. That’s hardly a principled argument for high crimes and misdemeanors.

This impeachment is purely political and entirely baseless, and most Republicans know it. Also this:

The Republican Party, in a nutshell: On Monday, they're going to kill the harshest immigration deal in decades because their nominee wants to run on the issue. On Tuesday, they're going to launch an impeachment inquiry on the DHS Secretary for not being harsher on immigration.
— Sawyer Hackett (@SawyerHackett) February 5, 2024

That helps Democrats make the case against it, pointing out that impeachment is no solution to what Republicans like to call the border crisis, and that it’s purely a political distraction. Here’s a statement from President Joe Biden’s administration:

Impeaching Secretary Mayorkas would be an unprecedented and unconstitutional act of political retribution that would do nothing to solve the challenges our Nation faces in securing the border. [...]
The impeachment power was never intended as a device for members of an opposing political party to harass Executive Branch officials over policy disputes. [...]

Impeaching Secretary Mayorkas would trivialize this solemn constitutional power and invite more partisan abuse of this authority in the future.

It’s as likely as not that all but three Republicans fall into line with their MAGA counterparts and move ahead with this baseless impeachment—one that’s sure to be buried by the Senate. This is yet another test of principle for Republicans, and one that the majority will gleefully fail.

Republicans admit impeaching Mayorkas is all politics

Republicans would rather campaign on the border crisis than solve it

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House Democrats come hard at GOP in Mayorkas impeachment hearing

Posted on January 31, 2024 by Joan McCarter

Following a contentious 15-hour debate, the House Homeland Security Committee voted in the wee hours of Wednesday morning to approve the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. The vote was strictly on party lines, 18-15, and Democrats used amendments and procedural motions to score plenty of hits against congressional Republicans for being the tools of Donald Trump.

One of those motions included having the clerk read aloud all amendments, including one from Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell that blasted the Republicans for using this impeachment to boost the campaign of Trump, “a narcissistic, hateful liar who was found by a court of law to have raped and defamed at least one woman,” and who is “currently facing 91 criminal charges for a wide variety of alleged offenses, including a felony conspiracy to defraud the United States.”

Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia of California had fun ridiculing Trump for his brilliant border plans, which have included “alligator moats, bombing northern Mexico, shooting migrants in the legs, and electrifying the fence, and putting spikes on them.”

Committee Democrats didn’t just take on Trump. They were having none of the MAGA nonsense from Republican committee members. Here’s Rep. Seth Magaziner of Rhode Island taking on Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene:

Magaziner: It’s pretty rich hearing the Rep. Greene express concern about terrorism when she was selling defund the FBI shirts and hats for $30. The leading agency tasked with combatting terrorism.. I’m not going to take any lectures from her on securing the homeland from terror pic.twitter.com/GUqput7zR8
— Acyn (@Acyn) January 31, 2024

“It’s pretty rich hearing the gentlewoman from Georige express her concern about terrorism when she literally was selling ‘defund the FBI’ T-shirts and hats on her website for $30 apiece,” Magaziner said. “The leading law enforcement agency tasked with combating terrorism in this country and keeping people safe, and she wants to defund it,” he continued. “I’m not going to take any lectures from her on securing this homeland from terror.”

Democrats also pointed out Republican actions to stymie Mayorkas, including lawsuits that hamper him from enforcing the law. “When the secretary and the administration has tried to use their limited authority to change policy to limit the number of people coming to the border, to streamline the process, to make it go through ports of entry, Republicans filed lawsuits to stop the administration from doing it,” Rep. Dan Goldman of New York correctly pointed out.

Goldman: The hypocrisy of you sitting here and accusing Mayorkas of failing to enforce the law when you are going to court to prevent him from enforcing the law… pic.twitter.com/YqtEsFsAXk
— Acyn (@Acyn) January 31, 2024

Republicans eventually shut down amendments from Democrats, playing into the Democrats’ hands. Ranking Democratic member Bennie Thompson of Mississippi blasted Republicans in a statement at the end of the night, criticizing them for shutting down debate “of their sham impeachment articles in the dark of night.

“They were either uncomfortable being confronted by the facts or they lacked the stamina to entertain a fulsome debate of a resolution the Committee entertained to buy off Marjorie Taylor Greene and the extreme MAGA Republicans who have taken over the Republican conference,” he said. That is also true—this sham was spearheaded by Greene.

The impeachment resolution is likely to come to the House floor next week, where its passage isn’t assured. There are still at least a few Republicans who have not committed to impeaching a cabinet official over a policy disagreement, and the Republican majority is so tiny that leadership can’t afford much defection. The Democratic conference is as united against the resolution as the committee Democrats are, and the impeachment won’t go anywhere in the Senate.

This isn’t about immigration policy, of course. This is about fighting President Joe Biden on immigration, which is just about the only issue Republicans have working in their favor in this election. Republican lawmakers themselves admit that.

Republicans would rather campaign on the border crisis than solve it

Congressman shreds Trump's worst 'ideas' for border security

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It is primary season, and Donald Trump seems pretty low energy these days. Kerry and Markos talk about the chances of Trump stumbling through the election season and the need to press our advantage and make gains in the House and Senate. Meanwhile, the right-wing media world is losing its collective minds about Taylor Swift registering younger Americans to vote!

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Republicans admit impeaching Mayorkas is all politics

Posted on January 30, 2024 by Joan McCarter

The House Homeland Security committee will vote Tuesday on two impeachment articles against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. House Republicans have been trying to dress up this impeachment—originated by very serious lawmaker Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene—as valid, arguing that Mayorkas “has willfully and systemically refused to comply with Federal immigration laws” and pretending it rises to the “high crimes and misdemeanors” threshold for impeachment. At the same time, Republican members are spilling the beans to right-wing media: This is all about the politics.

Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas admitted it on Fox News. Asked what the point of the exercise is when the Senate is sure not to act on it, he said it’s to ”send a message to the administration.” Watch:

.@RepMcCaul says on Fox News that House Republicans want to impeach Mayorkas to "send a message to the administration." No high crimes. Not even a misdemeanor! Just naked politics -- and they aren't even trying to hide it. pic.twitter.com/rEy2kshU6G
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 29, 2024

Rep. Claudia Tenney of New York told Newsmax the same thing. “This is sending a message to the Biden administration,” Tenney said. “This guy needs to go, and don’t put another person in place to do what Alejandro Mayorkas did.”

Republicans have been admitting this for weeks now, actually. Here’s Rep. Morgan Luttrell of Texas: “The impeachment process is necessary to send a message to the administration to say [Mayorkas is] not doing his job, and we’re feeling it … And if this is the way that we have to do it, this is the way it has to be done.”

Even Republicans admit this isn’t real and isn’t going anywhere. It’s about politics, and the Biden administration is rising to that challenge. It slapped back in a memo from the Department of Homeland Security, calling the impeachment “just more of the same political games” from Republicans.

“They don’t want to fix the problem; they want to campaign on it. That’s why they have undermined efforts to achieve bipartisan solutions and ignored the facts, legal scholars and experts, and even the Constitution itself in their quest to baselessly impeach Secretary Mayorkas,” the memo adds.

Republicans would rather campaign on the border crisis than solve it

House GOP kicks off a new year of dysfunction with another impeachment

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