Newly-elected House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has stated in the past that he is not interested in impeaching any Biden officials, but there’s at least one Biden administration official that McCarthy has publicly expressed an interest in impeaching: Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
In November, not long after the midterm elections, McCarthy gave Mayorkas an ultimatum: resign or face an impeachment inquiry.
“Our country may never recover from Secretary Mayorkas’ dereliction of duty. This is why today I am calling on the secretary to resign,” McCarthy said. “If Secretary Mayorkas does not resign, House Republicans will investigate every order, every action, and every failure. And we will determine whether we can begin an impeachment inquiry.”
But on Sunday, Mayorkas told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on This Week that he has no plans to resign.
Stephanopoulos played a clip of McCarthy promising to investigate Mayorkas’ actions and possibly begin an impeachment inquiry.
“What’s your response to the speaker?” Stephanopoulos asked.
“I am joining the President today on his visit to El Paso, Texas. I’ve been to the border quite a number of times. I am joining the President at the North American Leaders Summit in Mexico City to work with our partners in Mexico and Canada to address the security of the homeland,” Mayorkas replied. “I’ve got a lot of work to do. I’m proud to do it alongside 250,000 incredibly dedicated and talented individuals in the Department of Homeland Security, and I’m going to continue to do my work.”
“So you have no intention of resigning,” Stephanopoulos asked for clarification.
“I do not,” Mayorkas said. “I’ve got a lot of work to do, And we’re going to do it.”
Then Stephanopolous asked, “Are you prepared for the investigations?”
“I am. I will be. And I’ll continue to do my work throughout them.”
So it looks like Mayorkas is willing to be put under the GOP’s microscope, which, I suspect, means that an impeachment inquiry may be likely. In addition to the border crisis, Mayorkas will have to answer for punishing Border Patrol agents over whippings he knew never actually happened. Smearing Border Patrol agents to push a narrative hasn’t sat well with the GOP, and Mayorkas will have to answer for that.
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The big issue for McCarthy is that he’s going to have to make a legitimate effort to hold Biden administration officials accountable, and considering his very specific threat to Mayorkas, I would say he’ll have to make good on it — especially given the concessions he made in order to secure enough votes to be elected speaker. Among other things, McCarthy agreed to lower the number of members necessary to call for a motion to vacate the speaker’s chair down to just one single member.
With such a fragile hold on the speakership, McCarthy will have to follow through and investigate Mayorkas and other Biden officials — including Joe Biden himself.
Given the current state of the border crisis, it’s hard not to imagine that House Republicans will find enough evidence to justify impeaching Mayorkas.