Jan. 3 (UPI) — The Republican-controlled House Homeland Security Committee said Wednesday it will hold an impeachment hearing Jan. 10 against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
The committee is alleging Mayorkas has refused to enforce the laws passed by Congress.
In a Wednesday statement Committee Chair Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn., claimed its own investigation “made clear that this crisis finds its foundation in Secretary Mayorkas’ decision-making and refusal to enforce the laws passed by Congress, and that his failure to fulfill his oath of office demands accountability.”
Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., the top Democrat on the committee, said in a statement the GOP-led impeachment effort against Mayorkas is “completely baseless” and “a political stunt without any foundation in the Constitution.”
Mayorkas said he is busy working on solutions to the immigration problem and will continue to do so. He’s working with a bipartisan group of senators on border legislation.
Asked on MCNBC Wednesday if he will cooperate with the House impeachment investigation and hearings, Mayorkas replied, “I most certainly will. And I’m going to continue to do my work as well.”
Congress and several Republican and Democratic presidential administrations, including the Trump administration, for decades have failed to comprehensively address migration issues along the U.S. southern border.
But House Republicans blame the border crisis on the Biden administration and Mayorkas.
“There is no valid basis to impeach Secretary Mayorkas, as senior members of the House majority have attested, and this extreme impeachment push is a harmful distraction from our critical national security priorities,” DHS spokesperson Mia Ehrenberg said in a statement Wednesday.
But Green alleged Mayorkas is guilty of dereliction of duty and said in a statement that interviews with eight U.S. border patrol agents “reveal Mayorkas’ failure to enforce the laws of the United States and instead implementing policies that have caused and perpetuated this immigration crisis.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., said Speaker Mike Johnson guaranteed a Mayorkas impeachment vote in November after the House referred her articles of impeachment to the committee.
The announced impeachment of Mayorkas comes as Speaker Mike Johnson and a delegation of dozens of Republican House members tour the southern border.
They are blaming the border crisis on the Biden administration while blocking additional border security funding Biden has requested.
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