House GOP can’t afford another ‘no’ vote on Mayorkas impeachment

House Republicans cannot afford one more defection on a vote scheduled later Tuesday to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, assuming full attendance and unanimous Democratic opposition.

Two Republican lawmakers, Reps. Ken Buck (Colo.) and Tom McClintock (Calif.), have already announced they will vote against impeaching Mayorkas, arguing a Cabinet secretary should not be removed for carrying out the administration’s policy on migration and border policy.

That leaves no margin for error for Republicans, who could not pass the impeachment measure if another GOP lawmaker defects, assuming Democrats are in full attendance and vote against it.

It’s another sign of how the historically narrow GOP majority is making life difficult for House Republicans.

Vacancies in the House mean that with the current breakdown of 219 Republicans and 213 Democrats, Republicans can only afford to lose three votes on any party-line measure, assuming full attendance.

With House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) out for extended leave as he continues treatment for blood cancer, the GOP can afford to lose only two of its own votes.

Despite Tuesday’s announcement by McClintock that he would join Buck in voting “no,” House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) signaled confidence the impeachment resolution would pass.

“I’m confident that we have all our guys here. We’ll be able to do this,” Emmer told The Hill.

It’s unclear if every Democrat in the House will attend Tuesday’s vote.

The articles of impeachment accuse Mayorkas of violating immigration law — something the Department of Homeland Security adamantly refutes — as well as “breach of public trust.”

“The effort to impeach Secretary Mayorkas represents a dramatic departure from over two centuries of established understanding and precedent about the meaning of the Impeachment Clause of the Constitution and the proper exercise of that extraordinary tool,” Homeland Security lawyers wrote in a letter to the House Rules Committee on Monday.

“In addition to lacking any basis in the Constitution, the impeachment articles reflect a basic misrepresentation of key statutes governing immigration law.”

Buck and McClintock have both expressed concern over the case, saying their GOP colleagues are failing to meet the high crimes and misdemeanor standard laid out in the Constitution.

The House is scheduled to vote on the Mayorkas impeachment articles Tuesday evening. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told The Hill he was not considering pulling the vote amid the opposition from Buck and McClintock.

Still, several House Republicans, including some high-profile members, have not yet publicly revealed their planned votes. These members include Rep. Dave Joyce (R-Ohio), chair of the more moderate Republican Governance Group, and House Financial Services Committee Chair Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), who declined to elaborate on his position to reporters Tuesday morning.

In a closed-door House GOP conference meeting Tuesday morning, China Select Committee Chair Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) raised questions about the precedents for impeachment and the constitutional framework for impeachment, according to a source in the room. Gallagher declined to elaborate on what he said in the House GOP conference meeting.

Johnson said in a press conference that he had talked to Gallagher and McClintock “at great length” about their opposition Tuesday morning.

“I respect everybody’s view,” Johnson said, adding that “next to the declaration of war, impeachment is probably the heaviest authority that the House is given in the Constitution.”

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, McClintock expressed concerns that impeaching Mayorkas now could open the floodgates for more efforts against presidents, Supreme Court justices and Cabinet secretaries.

“I think that it lowers the grounds of impeachment to a point where we can expect it to be leveled against every conservative Supreme Court justice, every future Republican president and Cabinet member the moment the Democrats take control, and there will be nobody there to stop them, because we will have been complicit in redefining the fundamental definition of impeachment that the American founders placed in our Constitution,” he said.

The California Republican released a 10-page memo outlining his concerns with the impeachment push.

Buck, meanwhile, has said he does not believe Mayorkas committed an impeachable offense, while also expressing concerns about the precedent it would set.

“Secretary Mayorkas has completely failed at his job. He is incompetent. He is an embarrassment. And he will most likely be remembered as the worst secretary of Homeland Security in the history of the United States,” Buck wrote in an op-ed Monday. “However, the Constitution is clear that impeachment is reserved for ‘Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.’ Maladministration or incompetence does not rise to what our founders considered an impeachable offense.”

Adding to the pressure, House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) told reporters last week that she expects Democrats to be united against the question of impeaching Mayorkas.

Walking into Tuesday morning’s conference meeting, House Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green (R-Tenn.) said “we’ll see very soon” when asked if he had the votes to impeach Mayorkas. He said he had not spoken to McClintock “in a couple of days.”

One good sign for Republicans is that Rep. Hal Rogers (R-Ky.), who had been absent recently as he recovered from a car accident, is expected to be back in Washington this week and for the Mayorkas vote.

Yet they will not get any breathing room from Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.), who has been long absent for House votes as he campaigns for president in his long-shot bid for the Democratic nomination against President Biden. Phillips said Tuesday he he would vote against the impeachment articles in the evening.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), one of the leading figures in the push to impeach Mayorkas, said she believes Republicans have enough votes to oust the embattled Cabinet secretary.

“My understanding is I think we have the votes, but we will certainly see,” she told reporters when asked about Buck and McClintock’s opposition. “We’ll have debate on the floor later today and hopefully we’ll pass impeachment.”

Nick Robertson contributed.

Updated at 11:39 a.m. ET