Rep. Harriet Hageman (R-WY) delivered a scathing rebuke of President Joe Biden’s border chief on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Saturday after returning from a congressional visit to Yuma, Arizona.
Hageman, a member of the House Judiciary Committee, said that because Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has “abdicated his responsibilities,” bringing impeachment articles against him is “very likely.”
“I do believe that it’s very likely that there will be articles of impeachment brought against Mayorkas,” Hageman said. “And the reason being, he’s completely abdicated his responsibilities as the head of the Department of Homeland Security, and he is violating the oath of office that he took to protect this country from enemies, both foreign and domestic.”
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Hageman added, “He is not carrying out his obligations or responsibilities on the border. He needs to be held accountable for that and others do as well.”
The Biden Administration and Secretary Mayorkas must be held accountable for the invasion on our Southern border. The must do the job that each has sworn an oath to do. https://t.co/QfcGLWWFjK
— Rep. Harriet Hageman (@RepHageman) February 23, 2023
Hageman’s comments come after Reps. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) and Pat Fallon (R-TX) have already introduced articles of impeachment, and after GOP leaders, including Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and Whip Tom Emmer (R-MN), have conveyed an openness to investigating Mayorkas for impeachment-level breaches of duty.
The Judiciary Committee, as well as potentially other committees, would first have to conduct impeachment inquiries before Judiciary and subsequently the full House would then need to vote on impeachment articles.
Impeaching a cabinet member has not occurred in nearly 150 years, a testament to how egregiously inadequate Republicans feel Mayorkas has been at carrying out his job.
Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas responds to lawmakers’ questions during a hearing in Washington, DC, on May 4, 2022. (Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/Washington Post via Getty Images)
Millions of migrants have flooded across the border illegally under Mayorkas’s watch. U.S. Customs and Border Protection data shows border officials have encountered nearly five million migrants crossing into the U.S. illegally since January 2021, a number that does not include the estimated one million “got-aways,” i.e., those who have crossed over undetected.
“I come from a state of 560,000 people,” said Hageman, who represents Wyoming’s sole at-large congressional district. “More than ten times the population of Wyoming have crossed that border illegally in the last two years.”
Hageman, noting the “huge unintended consequences” of illegal migration, such as the burden it places on Americans’ wages, housing costs, and hospitals, said she was “getting to the point” where she feels the Biden administration has intentionally allowed the ongoing border crisis to perpetuate.
“There are huge unintended consequences — or maybe they’re intended,” she said. “I’m getting to the point where this administration has been told enough about these issues that they should know better, that they do know better, and so you have to start questioning whether … the miserable policies that are being pursued are intentional.”
Write to Ashley Oliver at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter at @asholiver.
