House Republicans are moving toward a chamber-wide vote on whether to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over the border crisis.
A Cabinet secretary has not been impeached since 1876.
Mayorkas is facing two impeachment articles, one that accuses him of having "refused to comply with Federal immigration laws" and the other of having violated "public trust."
Those articles passed out of the House Rules Committee on a party-line 8-4 vote Monday evening. That sets up a procedural rule vote that, if passed, will be followed by a House floor debate and then a final impeachment vote.
Three sources told Fox News Digital on Monday afternoon that they expect that vote to come Tuesday.
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House GOP leaders have accused Mayorkas of willfully disregarding existing federal laws and making deliberate policy decisions that have made the crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border worse.
Democrats, meanwhile, have painted Republicans’ impeachment push as political and argued the impeachment articles have no basis.
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But the effort has served to largely unite what’s been a very divided House GOP conference this term. Even moderates from districts where President Biden won in 2020, like Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., have said they’d support Mayorkas’ impeachment.
It’s a good sign for Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., who will need every Republican vote he can get to pass the historic measure. He’s presiding over a razor-thin House GOP majority, but the expected returns this week of Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., and Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Ky., from medical absences will give him slightly more wiggle room.
At least one House Republican is against the impeachment push so far, while at least four more were undecided as of late last week.
Rep. Ken Buck, R-Colo., told reporters last week that he was a "solid" no against impeaching Mayorkas. Buck criticized the Biden official for his handling of the southern border crisis but said, "The people that I’m talking to on the outside, the constitutional experts, former members agree that this just isn’t an impeachable offense."
Mayorkas himself slammed the impeachment articles as baseless accusations in a letter to House Homeland Security Secretary Mark Green, R-Tenn., last week.
"I assure you that your false accusations do not rattle me and do not divert me from the law enforcement and broader public service mission to which I have devoted most of my career and to which I remain devoted," Mayorkas wrote.
The impeachment proceedings will be a stark juxtaposition to Senate leaders' efforts to pass a bipartisan border security deal this week, talks which Mayorkas has been a part of.
