Alejandro N. Mayorkas, the secretary of homeland security committee, was the target of two articles of impeachment released by House Republicans on Sunday.
President Biden’s top immigration official accused of breaking the law and betraying public confidence in his management of an influx of migrants at the border between the United States and Mexico.
Before a hearing on Tuesday to accept the charges, leaders of the House Homeland Security Committee presented their case against Mr. Mayorkas, clearing the way for a swift House vote to impeach him as early as next month.
It would be the climax of the Republican assault on Mr. Biden’s immigration policy and a remarkable step considering the growing legal academic agreement that Mr. Mayorkas’s acts do not amount to serious felonies or misdemeanors.
The campaign contrasts with House Republicans’ intensification of their opposition to a bipartisan border deal that Mr. Mayorkas assisted in arranging with a group of senators and that Mr. Biden has promised to sign, spurred on by former President Donald J. Trump.
Members of the House G.O.P. have rejected the accord, claiming it is too weak and that they cannot rely on Mr. Biden to enforce immigration laws now as he has in the past failed to do so.
What the two released article says?
In the first article of impeachment the Biden administration’s border policies are effectively labeled as official crimes . It charges Mr. Mayorkas with deliberately and methodically breaking laws that demand that migrants be detained by implementing “catch and release” policies that permit some people to remain in the country while legal proceedings are ongoing and others who are fleeing certain war-torn and economically devastated nations to temporarily reside and work here. The president has extensive discretion to do both under immigration statutes.
The second article accuses Mr. Mayorkas of undermining legislators’ attempts to look into him by lying to Congress about how safe the border was
The head of the House Homeland Security committee, Republican Representative Mark Green of Tennessee, stated in a statement that “these articles lay out a clear, compelling and irrefutable case for Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’s impeachment.” “It is the responsibility of Congress to ensure that the executive branch carries out and upholds the laws that we have passed.”
What if the whole house approves the allegations?
If the whole House approves the accusations against Mr. Mayorkas, they very certainly won’t go anywhere in the Democratic-led Senate, where a two-thirds majority would be required to convict and remove him from office.
But as Mr. Trump, who has made a crackdown on immigration his trademark issue, tries to secure the Republican presidential nomination to challenge Mr. Biden, the procedure would result in an extraordinary political spectacle during election season.
Leading Republicans and Democrats have begun the charges in an effort to preserve the bipartisan border security agreement that is making its way through the Senate. The agreement would toughen the process of requesting asylum, expand the number of people who can be detained, and compel a stop to crossings if the number of migrants encountered rises above 5,000 on a weekly average.
What Biden said about these accusations?
Mr. Biden has pledged to “shut down the border” if Congress gives him the agreement, While Mr. Trump has pushed G.O.P. legislators to reject the deal on the grounds that it is insufficient, Speaker Mike Johnson has declared that the agreement is likely “dead on arrival” in the House and has committed to bringing Mr. Mayorkas’s impeachment articles to a vote “as soon as possible.”
For more than a year, House leaders have been threatening to hold Mr. Mayorkas personally accountable for an increase in drug trafficking and migrant crossings along the southern border with Mexico. Following months in which Republican leaders were unable to generate enough support within their own ranks, their efforts have picked up steam in recent weeks.
This month, the committee rapidly proceeded with the impeachment process, conducting just two hearings and interrogating no federal officials, including Mr. Mayorkas, before its G.O.P. members unanimously supported pressing charges.
