Top House Homeland Security Committee Democrat Bennie Thompson (D-MS) used a hearing on the border crisis to instead call for the impeachment of Donald Trump.
In the kickoff hearing in impeachment proceedings for Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Thompson, who chaired Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) Select Committee on January 6, did not mention the words “border,” “cartel,” or “opioid” during his questioning of witnesses.
Instead, he only addressed the Democrat witness, law professor Frank Bowman, while making the case for Trump’s impeachment. He failed to use the full time allotted to him, time which could have been used to ask witnesses about policies which could ease the pain inflicted on Americans by the border crisis.
The senior Democrat claimed that while Trump “clearly [committed] an impeachable offense” there were “clearly no grounds” to impeach Mayorkas. Yet at the same time he relitigated Trump’s impeachment — for which he was acquitted twice by the Senate, Thompson “urge[d] Republicans to put politics aside and get back to work for the American people.”
Despite assertions from committee Democrats, the Constitution does not require one to have committed a crime to be impeached. The scope of “high crimes and misdemeanors,” a term from English common law pre-dating the U.S. Constitution, includes failure to faithfully execute one’s duties or follow the law, as well as a failure to abide by one’s oath of office.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), in a letter sent to his Republican colleagues Wednesday morning, laid out the case for impeaching Mayorkas which included charges of Mayorkas lying under oath — a clearly impeachable offense.
Rep. @chiproytx to colleagues on Sec. Mayorkas: "The Case for Impeachment Has Never Been Stronger"
— Bradley Jaye (@bradleyajaye) January 10, 2024
Roy's letter makes the case Mayorkas
1) lied under oath
2) failed to faithfully execute laws/violated oath
3) willfully endangered Americans pic.twitter.com/olBKgl6E0Y
Democrats’ focus on Trump — at the expense of border security — comes amid anxiety over the former president continuing to gain strength just days before the election season officially kicks off with the Iowa caucus.
Michelle Obama said in a recent interview she is “terrified about what could possibly happen” in the 2024 elections, referring to Trump’s strong polling against Joe Biden.
Other Democrat members spent the hearing attacking Republicans and ignoring the border crisis. Rep. Donald Payne (D-NJ) went as far as saying instead of focusing on securing the border, Americans should blame themselves for the opioid epidemic, arguing demand is to blame for the lawlessness at the border.
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA), who specifically mentioned during his questioning that he was rejected from Georgetown University’s law school twice, used his time to run down a checklist of specific crimes, asking the Attorneys General witnesses if those crimes were impeachable.
Like Thompson, Swalwell did not ask expert witnesses about the definition of “high crimes and misdemeanors,” the actual issue at hand for which Republicans seek to impeach Mayorkas.
Another Democrat, Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-IL), the daughter of Guatemalan immigrants and whose husband is a “dreamer” — a term used to describe one born to an illegal immigrant, used her questions to make the case that the committee’s time could be better spent importing additional foreign labor, increasing personnel and other resources to more quickly process illegal migrants entering the country, and investing in the economies of Latin American nations — including engaging “nation building.”
Although a viewer watching Democrat questions might be surprised, the hearing was titled “Havoc in the Heartland: How Secretary Mayorkas’ Failed Leadership Has Impacted the States.”
Thompson was first elected to the House in 1993, when Tag Team’s “Whoomp! (There It Is)” topped the charts.
Bradley Jaye is a Capitol Hill Correspondent for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter at @BradleyAJaye.
