Dem
51
GOP
49
Every Republican voted to start formally investigating Joe Biden for a possible impeachment, despite zero evidence that he committed any high crimes or misdemeanors. Not carrying out the opposition's policies is not a crime or an abuse of power. But oh boy, are the 17 House Republicans in districts Biden won going to hear about their votes. Their Democratic challengers are going to hammer them over and over on the vote. And the nice thing about a vote is that it is an "aye" or "nay" thing, unlike a position on some issue where there may be wiggle room. Either you voted to investigate Biden or you voted against it. This vote could well be the thing that flips control of the House by sending many of the Biden 17 to the unemployment office. Here's how The Hill illustrated the problem:
Neal Kwatra, a New York Democratic consultant said of the Republicans: "They're gift wrapping an issue for Democrats to prosecute against them in 2024. Most of these guys were off-year wins and have never had to defend these seats in a presidential election year."
New York has six of the Biden 17 and California has five. Both states are loaded with qualified state senators, assembly members, mayors, and others who will duke it out in the primaries, but once a candidate is chosen, the vote to investigate Biden for no reason other than "Trump wants to get even" is going to play a big role. Voters who support Biden—and they form majorities in these districts, by definition—aren't going to like that.
The Biden 17 are already working on waffling. Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) said there is not sufficient evidence to impeach Biden. Actually, there is no evidence at all. Then why did he vote to start the process? All of the Biden 17 are going to try to walk back their votes and talk about "innocent until proven guilty." But Democrats are just going to beat people like Lawler over the head with their votes. Biden won Lawler's district, which is D+3, by 10 points. Lawler's got a big problem now, especially in a presidential year. Some Republicans are going to try to split hairs and say: "I voted to start the investigation but I might later vote against impeachment if the evidence is insufficient." We suspect that many Democrats are going to say: "Your representative voted to try to impeach the president" because many voters don't know the difference between a procedural vote and a straight-up-or-down vote on impeachment. Trying to argue "process" is going to be a tough sell with Democrats. And most of them are in their first term, so they don't have years of goodwill built up.
So why did the GOP leadership force these vulnerable members to self-immolate? The base hates Biden because he is a Democrat. What he does as president doesn't matter. If the Biden 17 were allowed to vote their district, the motion would not have passed. Those votes were needed as there are only 221 Republicans in the House. So the leadership had to turn the screws on them (e.g., say that a "no" vote meant no help from the NRCC in 2024). They got their resolution through, but the price may be high if they lose a dozen of those races in 2024.
Republicans are not even unified on their attempt to embarrass Biden. Yesterday, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said on Meet the Press: "If there were a smoking gun, I think we'd be talking about it." Graham doesn't believe there is anything to the investigation. He added: "They have to prove that President Biden somehow financially benefited from the business enterprises of Hunter Biden." (V)