Dem
51
GOP
49
House Republicans have formally voted to investigate the possibility of impeaching Joe Biden because he, well, he is a Democrat and the Democrats impeached one of their guys. Twice. But some cooler, wiser heads have realized that impeaching Biden might not be a good move because they know what happened to the Republicans after they impeached Bill Clinton in 1998—and he actually committed a crime (perjury), whereas Biden hasn't committed any crimes.
Consequently, House Republicans now have a backup plan. The Homeland Security Committee has scheduled a meeting for Jan. 10 to consider impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Mike Johnson has approved the plan. This way, if the Republicans get cold feet and decide that impeaching Biden and then losing a couple dozen swing seats in 2024 is not worth it, they can impeach Mayorkas. That will please their base and do far less damage because most Americans have no idea who Mayorkas is and probably can't even pronounce his name correctly.
The nominal charge against Mayorkas is that he has failed to enforce the immigration laws he took an oath to enforce. White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre called the whole thing a "political stunt."
We're not so sure this stunt will work out so well. Remember, as described above, Biden is going to hammer the Republicans for not providing the money to increase border security. If the Republicans impeach Mayorkas for not defending the border, he is going to loudly proclaim: "I wanted to defend the border better, but you jerks refused to appropriate the money I needed to do so. So whose fault is this?" In the court of public opinion, that might sound like a pretty good defense. If so, who is going to get the blame in Nov. 2024? Might just be the Republicans. (V)