White House: GOP’s Mayorkas impeachment push is unconstitutional

The White House argued Thursday that the House GOP’s push to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas is unconstitutional, urging lawmakers to drop it and work with President Biden on immigration reform.

White House oversight spokesperson Ian Sams in a memo with the title “Legal Experts and Constitutional Scholars Agree: Mayorkas Impeachment Stunt is Baseless and Unconstitutional,” said the GOP effort is an attempt to make Mayorkas a “scapegoat” and a “stunt” showing “blatant disregard for the Constitution.”

Sams cited a Jan. 10 letter from 24 legal experts calling the impeachment unconstitutional. He singled out conservative commentator and legal scholar Jonathan Turley, who said in a recent op-ed that Republicans lack sufficient evidence to boot Mayorkas. 

He also cited University of Missouri professor and constitutional law scholar Frank Bowman, who testified before the House Homeland Security Committee last week and said impeachment over policy disagreements is contrary to constitutional understanding.

“Legal scholars and historians from across the political spectrum agree: House Republicans’ latest impeachment effort fails to meet any constitutional or legal standard. It’s well past time for Republicans to drop this baseless political stunt and work with the President on real solutions to address the challenges we face,” Sams said.

The House began a series of impeachment hearings into Mayorkas on Wednesday.

An internal Republican memo obtained by The Hill showed the Republicans have committed to a timeline, and the House Homeland Security Committee decided last week it would mark up an impeachment resolution for Mayorkas at the end of the month.

Sams noted in his memo that Mayorkas is working with Senate Republicans and Democrats to reach an agreement on measures to strengthen the border, talks that have been taking place since before the holiday.

“Instead of working across the aisle to find bipartisan solutions to strengthen border security and fix an immigration system that has been broken for decades, House Republicans are choosing to play extreme, far-right politics by following leader Marjorie Taylor Greene into a baseless impeachment stunt targeting Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas,” Sams said.

The House Homeland Security Committee backtracked on plans to have Mayorkas deliver public testimony as part of his impeachment proceedings, instead demanding written testimony Wednesday.

Mayorkas’s office said it was unable to meet the first request for testimony because the secretary would be hosting a delegation from Mexico and asked to find another time.